Japanese import restrictions announced

Controls on food imports from Japan are to be introduced following the incident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, the Food Safety Authority of Ireland confirmed today.

The move comes after EU member states agreed to impose restrictions on food and feedstuff from Japan harvested or processed before March 11th, the date when the country was hit by the devastating earthquake and tsunami which has left more than 27,000 people dead or missing.

The disaster caused serious damage the Fukushima Daiichi plant on Japan's northeast Pacific coast and some 700 engineers have been working around the clock to try to stabilise the facility.

The Food Safety Authority said the new EU regulation stipulates that each consignment of food or feed from Japan has to be accompanied by a declaration - to be provided by the Japanese authorities - attesting that the product does not contain levels of radionuclides that exceed the EU's maximum permitted levels.

"A range of measures will apply to all feed and food originating in or consigned from 12 localities of Japan, including the four most affected by the accident," said the authority's chief executive Prof Alan Reilly.

"All products from these localities will have to be tested before leaving Japan and will be subject to random testing in the EU. Feed and food products from the remaining 35 localities will have to be accompanied by a declaration stating the locality of origin and will be randomly tested upon arrival in the EU," he added.

The restrictions on imports from Fukushima, Gunma, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Miyagi, Yamagata, Niigata, Nagano, Yamanashi, Saitama, Tokyo and Chiba will remain in force until the end of June.