Russia suggests Ukrainian cheese makers individually resolve export ban

The head of Russia’s Rospotrebnadzor, a state service responsible for the protection of consumer rights, which banned the import of Ukrainian cheese said last week the Ukrainian Agriculture Ministry has done little to organize and facilitate quality checks of Ukrainian cheese makers, Interfax reported. The Ukrainian Agriculture Ministry denied the allegations. Inspections should have started yesterday and might have led to the removal of the ban for qualified cheese makers. Instead, Rospotrebnadzor’s head suggested Ukrainian cheese producers start negotiations with them directly, bypassing intermediation from the Ukrainian government. Separately, representatives of Milkiland (MLK PW), one of the victims of the Russian cheese ban, told us that they still expected their plant to be inspected on March 26, as scheduled last week.

Yegor Samusenko: While the dueling claims from the governmental agencies add fuel to the milk war, we see the Rospotrebnadzor now having a constructive position, and we thus expect a solution to the conflict likely before the end of April, before the high season for cheese imports to Russia begins.