The head of the Egyptian Agricultural Quarantine, Ahmed al-Attar, announced that Egypt received its first Indian wheat shipment on Saturday which were confirmed to fit all specifications.
During a telephone interview with CBC channel, Attar assured that there is no complacency or waiver of any requirements or rules in wheat import operations.
“We refused to transfer an Indian wheat shipment from Turkey to Egypt, because it did not conform to standards,” he added.
“The quarantine requirements are a “red line” that cannot be tolerated, and we check wheat shipments in warehouses in India before they reach Egypt, in order to ensure the quality of these grains and their compliance with the standard specifications that have been approved for wheat,” he explained.
The Agricultural Quarantine approved the shipment of Indian wheat– amounting to 55,000 tons – after examining it at one of the international laboratories approved by the European Union.
The Plant Quarantine also conducted a thorough examination of all wheat quantities before and during loading on the boat from the port of Kandla in India.
Bloomberg revealed in March that India is in final talks to start exporting wheat to Egypt, the world’s largest importer, after the Russian invasion to Ukraine upset global supplies.
India is the second largest wheat producing country in the world, the report said, adding that the largest purchaser of Indian wheat in 2020-2021 was Bangladesh.
Egypt, Lebanon and Libya are among the Arab countries that depend the most on wheat from Russia and Ukraine, while Egypt ranks first globally in importing wheat.
Ukraine provides food for about 400 million people around the world, as Ukrainian farmers, and the Ukrainian armed forces, defend food security not only in Ukraine, but in the whole world.
