The head of the Rosselkhoznadzor, Sergei Dankvert, spoke in an interview with RBC about the gaps in the Russian system for monitoring the quality of Mercury products. According to him, some manufacturers manage to bypass the monitoring system and pass off low-quality products as goods of the middle and higher segments. He cited sausages and canned fish as examples.

According to him, some entrepreneurs who are “smart for inventions” often seek to replace expensive raw materials with cheaper ones. Dankwert acknowledges that it is normal to seek to benefit by replacing cheap raw materials with expensive ones, but the consumer should be informed about this, otherwise it is fraud.

“Do you want to make a “Doctor’s” sausage from a lung or a trachea and write “GOST”? But this is indecent. Why? According to GOST, it is supposed to add at least 75% of meat. Many meat processing plants do not understand that today we analyze the raw materials that they use in the production of their products. And it’s very embarrassing to look when they write “Sausages for children. GOST" or "Servelat for children. GOST“,” the head of the Rosselkhoznadzor explained.

The official noted that after the introduction of the automated monitoring system "Mercury" in 2018, the number of such cases began to decline, but even in the current conditions, when products are controlled at almost all stages of production, some companies manage to violate the standards. The system traces all products of animal origin and allows the authorities to quickly obtain information about what a particular product, such as sausage, is made of.

Violations by producers, according to the head of the Rosselkhoznadzor, are due to “impunity”, and administrative penalties for such violations are not enough. Dankvert assures that the Rosselkhoznadzor is working in conjunction with other departments to reduce the volume of low-quality products and falsification. However, this work is not always adequately perceived at the level of regional authorities, which are engaged in the purchase of food products for state institutions.

“It is necessary to understand that they should not purchase and send falsified products to social institutions with budget money. Unfortunately, our form of public procurement is such that everything is determined by cost, not quality, ”the official said, urging regional authorities to use Mercury more often to check the quality of products purchased for schools and hospitals.

In 2021, the Russian canned fish market faced massive fakes and falsifications of products. Against the backdrop of a shortage of high-quality fish, primarily saury, manufacturers began to pass off products made from other, cheaper types of fish for these canned goods. The agency reacted with a delay, but admitted that in the summer of 2021, up to 50% of canned saury fish was fake.