Guide – finding an authorised country and establishment for import to the EU
A number of steps must be carried out to import food of animal origin from a non-EU country. First, the food must come from an authorised country. Second, the country needs to have an approved residue control plan. Third, your products need to come from an authorised establishment. This guide will help you, step by step, to sort all this out.
Keep in mind that if you intend to import a composite product containing several animal ingredients, all of these must come from an authorised country and establishment. You will thus have to do the search multiple times, once for each animal ingredient.
Step 1 – Find out whether a food of animal origin comes from a country authorised for import into the EU
Authorised country based on EU legislation
1) Find the category of product you are importing. For example, if you intend to import ice cream, the category is Milk and possibly Eggs. You will get many hits.
2) Click through the hits until you find the article that refers to an annex of countries approved for the category you want to import.
The annex of authorised countries for a specific type of food of animal origin can be found in either Regulation (EU) 2021/405 or 2021/404.
3) Once you have found the right annex, search for the country in question to see whether it is approved for export to the EU.
As the lists of authorised countries for food of animal origin are constantly changing, you need to be sure that you are looking at the list with the latest changes. This may mean that you have to look at several different lists, as the latest change is always the one that applies.
If there are subsequent amendments to the legislation after the latest consolidated version, you will need to search all amended versions by country of export and the relevant food of animal origin to ensure that you have the latest information. To access subsequent amendentments, go to Document Information for the legal act in EUR-Lex and check under the heading Modified by.
If you find the country and product you intend to import in any of the amendments, it is this information about the country and food of animal origin that applies.
If you cannot find the country and product you intend to import, go to the latest consolidated version. Find the annex for the country and the food of animal origin concerned.
If you are completely unable to find the country from which you intend to import a particular food of animal origin, you are not allowed to import from that country at this stage.
Example: You want to import milk
In Regulation (EU) 2021/405, search (Ctrl F) for “milk” using the search box. This will bring up Articles 15 and 16, which refer to Annex XVII and Annex XVIII of Regulation (EU) 2021/404. There you will find lists of countries authorised to export milk products to the EU.
Example: You intend to import fish from Argentina
Search (Ctrl F) for “fish” in the latest amendment of Regulation (EU) 2021/405 and see if you get a hit. If there are no hits, search (Ctrl F) for “fish” in the latest consolidated version. You will see that the list of countries authorised to import fish is in Annex IX. It shows that Argentina is authorised to export fish to the EU without restrictions.
For some non-EU countries, there are restrictions on what they are authorised for
Example: You intend to import fish from Angola
Annex IX of Regulation (EU) 2021/405, which regards fishery products, shows that Angola is only authorised to export wild-caught fishery products as it says “Only wild catch” in the annex.
Additional examples:
- “Aquaculture: only finfish” – the country is allowed to export wild-caught fishery products, but for aquaculture only finfish
- “Aquaculture: only crustaceans” – the country is allowed to export wild-caught fishery products, but for aquaculture only crustaceans
- “Only aquaculture products” – the country is not allowed to export wild-caught fishery products
For some non-EU countries, only certain states are authorised to export a certain food of animal origin to the EU
Example: You intend to import beef from Brazil
Due to the risk of spreading foot-and-mouth disease, you are only allowed to import beef from certain states in Brazil.
Step 2 – find out whether the country has an approved residue control plan
In order for a country to export food of animal origin to the EU, it must have an approved residue control plan. This means that the country has a plan in place to check that there are no residues of medicines, such as antibiotics, in food. The country you intend to import from (the country of origin) must have an approved residue control plan for each food of animal origin you want to import.
Proceed as follows to find out whether the country has an approved residue control plan for the food of animal origin you intend to import
Please note that the following products of animal origin do not need to have an approved residue control plan in order to be exported to the EU:
- Wild-caught fishery products
- Gelatine
- Collagen
- Highly processed products listed in Section XVI point 1 of Annex III to Regulation (EC) No 853/2004
For these foods, the only requirement is that the food of animal origin comes from an approved country as per Step 1. If you are not sure whether you have found the right information – contact the Swedish Food Agency via our “Ask us” (Fråga oss) forum.
Ask us (in Swedish)
Step 3 – Find out whether the food you intend to import comes from an authorised establishment
Once you know that the food you intend to import comes from an authorised country and that there is an approved residue control plan, you need to find out whether the establishment you want to import from is approved for import into the EU.
2) Select non-EU countries – Establishment lists
3) This takes you to the TRACES.NT platform. Enter the country in the search box.
4) Select the relevant food of animal origin from the list (see examples of categories below) and click on the symbol that looks like an eye.
5) A list of establishments authorised to import the animal food in question into the EU then opens.
6) Also check the “Remarks” column to see whether the establishment's authorisation has any restrictions, such as which animal species the establishment is authorised for.
Examples of categories and definitions in the establishment lists
Meat products: Processed products resulting from the processing of meat or from the further processing of such processed products, so that the cut surface shows that the product no longer has the characteristics of fresh meat (Regulation (EC) No 853/2004).
Processing: Any action that substantially alters the initial product, including heating, smoking, curing, maturing, drying, marinating, extraction, extrusion or a combination of those processes (Regulation (EC) No 852/2004).
Meat preparations: Fresh meat, including meat that has been reduced to fragments, which has had foodstuffs, seasonings or additives added to it or which has undergone processes insufficient to modify the internal muscle fibre structure of the meat and thus to eliminate the characteristics of fresh meat (Regulation (EC) No 853/2004).
