By the Gazette Editorial Board The application of the new inter-ministerial system for exporting agricultural crops is showing signs of success, as so evidenced by the growing appeal for such products in foreign markets. Last Thursday, Agriculture Minister Dr Ezzeddin Abu Steit, unveiled in statements reported by the Middle East News Agency (MENA) that fresh marketing opportunities for Egyptian citrus and grapes abroad have been created, including the latest such opening in Uruguay, as a result of talks between the bodies concerned in the two countries during which the Egyptian side expounded the measures that have been jointly put in effect by the ministries of trade and agriculture to ensure the high quality of our agricultural exports and the procedures that have been initiated to upgrade the exportability of Egyptian agricultural crops in addition of course to the improvement of the quality and specifications of such products and their suitability for consumption at both local and external markets. Stressing the positive impact of the new agricultural export system on increasing the volume of our exports, the Head of the Central Directorate for Agricultural Quarantine, Dr Ahmed al-Attar, explained that observance of the criteria in effect in importing markets has, in combination with monitoring and lab test measures that the departments concerned pursue, has contributed to the emergence of a growing appeal for Egyptian agricultural products in markets abroad. Of relevance to this development was a statement that the Chairman of the Agricultural Crop Exporting Council, Abdul-Hameed al-Dimerdash, gave on the same day, indicating that arrangements are under way to identify the farms and stations whose citrus products will be exportable to Vietnam following the latter's Food Safety Board's approval of registering Egypt as a citrus exporter. The choice of farms and handling stations, he noted, qualifies them to join the new system for monitoring the production and export of agricultural products. Initiated by virtue of a joint decree by the ministries of trade and agriculture last year, the new mechanism aims at guaranteeing that Egyptian agricultural exports are both safe and compatible with the standards and criteria set out by the importing markets. With such a mechanism in action, the volume of our exports of agricultural products increased by 13 per cent during the eight months between September 2017 and April this year. The Exporting Council will, as Mr Dimerdash indicated, seek to realise the accessibility of Egyptian agricultural products to African and Southeast Asian markets. The ongoing boost in exporting agricultural products has the twin advantages of motivating larger productivity at home and earning the country greater revenues.
