Belarus bans most of Russian tea products

Belarus suddenly banned the sale of Russian-made tea. According to the Ministry of Health of Belarus, the reason for this decision was a violation of requirements for microbiological indicators of product safety.

Photo: flickr.com by Selena N. B. H. is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic

Sanitary services of Belarus found traces of fungus in several types of tea produced by Orimi LLC, a Russian legal entity. Belarus banned all brands of tea produced by this company, their import into Belarus was restricted as well. The list of prohibited products includes such tea brands as:

• Greenfield,
• TESS,
• Princess Nuri,
• Princess Java,
• as well as some types of Jardin and Jockey coffee.

Orimi LLC is taking necessary measures to prove the stability of production processes and effectiveness of the safety control system, the Belarusian Ministry of Health added. Restrictions on the sale of products may be lifted as soon as the company meets all relevant requirements of the Health Ministry of Belarus.

At the same time, Orimi representatives said that the Belarus authorities overreacted. Fungus may have appeared in tea products due to violations of transportation or storage requirements after the tea had been delivered to Belarus, the company representative said. Therefore, it is unclear who should be responsible for the identified violations, the manufacturer believes.