GUYANA is now awaiting a response from the United States (US) government following the completion of several stipulated requirements to lift the exportation ban on catfish.

“It’s a work-in-progress and I’m optimistic. We have submitted all the legal documents and now we are waiting on the authorities over there,” Agriculture Minister, Zulfikar Mustapha, said on Tuesday.

He added: “Recently, we have had the entire Fisheries Act being updated [and] we have already submitted because you know our country was blacklisted from exporting catfish to the United States.”

Back in November 2017, Guyana, along with several other countries, was temporarily banned from exporting catfish. The country had fallen short in several requirements to meet US standards.
For Guyana, these requirements included the lack of inspectors on plants along with insufficient documentation detailing the sanitation and Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) process, along with how the industry manages adulterated catfish products.

“We are working very assiduously to reverse that ban with the US administration. I am very optimistic that we will have that done shortly,” Mustapha added.
Guyana has already begun to review its Fisheries Act to ensure that the requirements are met.

EARLY WARNING
Exporters of catfish were required by the US Food and Safety Inspection Services (FSIS) to provide documentation to verify that their inspection system was in keeping with US standards. This protocol came into effect in 2016.

Exporters here were given a transitional period to update their regulations and provide the relevant documentation. Failure to do this within the timeline, however, saw the United States imposing a ban on catfish imports from Guyana in September 2017.

“The United States administration would have already warned the previous government two years prior to the ban that they have to put their house in order or they will ban this product. They did not heed that authority’s warning, and, as a result of that we are now faced with the ban,” Mustapha said in a previous report.

Since assuming office as the Agriculture Minister in 2020, Mustapha, along with a team of technical officers from the fisheries department, has worked to remove the ban.

“When I became Minister of Agriculture, the President instructed that I go and deal with this matter promptly and we started meetings immediately with the United States embassy,” he said.
Exporters of catfish have been severely affected over the past few years as a result of the ban.