Freshfel Europe meets with Vietnamese officials to discuss plant health and market access 

Freshfel Europe’s team met with a delegation of Vietnamese officials on 30 June to discuss plant health as well as market access issues at the request of the Vietnamese authorities, who were interested in better understanding the work of EU authorities, stakeholders as well as the way in which EU legislation operates in practice. 

In the meeting, the possibilities for boosting the use of cold treatment were discussed in detail, and Vietnamese officials explained that there would need to be a significant investment to build cold chain storage and cold treatment infrastructure in the country in order to facilitate cold treatment in the country, but that they were willing to undertake it provided they could receive funding or cooperate with EU authorities to do so. 

Moreover, specific instances of the use of cold treatment for some EU fruit exports to the country were discussed, and while officials were amenable to Freshfel arguments, they pointed out difficulties with some of the varieties in relation to the lists of applicable quarantine pests.