Moldovan delegation to arrive in Moscow for talks to resume wine export

A Moldovan government delegation on September 19 will leave for a two-day visit to Moscow, where it plans to discuss resumption of wine export to Russia, the Moldovan economy minister's adviser Vitaly Kondratsky told Itar-Tass. Vice-Premier and Economy Minister Valeriu Lazar, who is co-chairman of the Russian-Moldovan intergovernmental commission on trade and economic cooperation, will head the delegation. Agriculture Minister Vasily Bumakov is also expected to be in the team. The delegation will participate in the CIS Economic Council meeting and will have talks with representatives of the Russian economy and energy ministries and Gazprom. Lazar may meet once more with the Russian co-chairman of the intergovernmental commission, Vice Premier Dmitry Rogozin, Kondratsky said. Earlier, Russian chief sanitary inspector Gennady Onishchenko stated that supplies of Moldovan wine products were halted because of their low quality. According to him, harmful substances, such as dibutylphthalate, were detected in Moldovan wine. In some batches, their concentration exceeded safe levels by 80-90 times. The Russian federal consumer rights protection service (Rospotrebnadzor), headed by Onishchenko, links the cases with poor control by Moldovan authorities over the winery sector. After that, the Moldovan government took measures to tighten control over the quality of products for export. The authorities decided to restore the department, which was abolished in 2009, at the Agriculture Ministry to be in charge of the winery sector. The agriculture minister instructed winegrowers to receive certification from the national quality testing centre for each batch of alcohol products for export to Russia.