With poor «deplorable hygiene conditions» and «little traceability», Morocco does not have the European Union's backing to export its chickens to the 27 countries. This is reported by the daily newspaper L'Economiste on Monday. The media shed light on the report issued by the EU experts during an initial audit carried out from the 6th to the 14th of March. «At the end of this audit, the conclusions were drafted by experts from the EU,» the same source added, with somewhat unclear results on the health control system of ONSSA (National Office for Food Safety, ed.). The latter states that, contrary to the communiqué published by ONSSA on the 30th of September and which states that «the verification mission (...) was conducted in good conditions», the conclusions of the European experts explain that «the conditions did not fully met the health certification». A sanitary certification granted to farms that produces poultry meat and which export it to the EU. The authors of the report singled out the ONSSA for surveillance of livestock, the «effective capacity» of controls and the authorities' inability to identify and report possible outbreaks of infection in relation to certain poultry-related diseases. «The EU experts also pinpointed weaknesses in the traceability and sanitary conditions of poultry transport and the lack of a national database that could facilitate such controls,» writes L'Economiste. «Responding to the recommendations of the EU experts», ONSSA said that it is "committed to meet the shortcomings found by proposing a plan of action oriented in this direction». L'Economist also informed that a final audit is scheduled for the month of December 2017 to evaluate the endorsement of the poultry sector. A lire sur L'Economiste d'aujourd'hui : "Sans surprise... le poulet refusé par l'UE!" pic.twitter.com/tDsBGApemj — L'Economiste (@Leconomiste_) 9 octobre 2017
