Egypt receives first shipment of Indian wheat, meets all quarantine specifications

Cairo/New Delhi: Egypt received its first shipment of Indian wheat – of 55,000 tons — on Saturday that met with all quarantine specifications, the head of the Egyptian Agricultural Quarantine, Ahmed al-Attar has said.
Attar told CBC channel that there has been “no complacency or waiver of any requirements or rules in wheat import operations”.
“We refused to transfer an Indian wheat shipment from Turkey to Egypt, because it did not conform to standards,” he told the Egyptian channel.
“The quarantine requirements are a “red line” that cannot be tolerated, and we check wheat shipments in warehouses in India before they reach Egypt, in order to ensure the quality of the grains and their compliance with the standard specifications that have been approved for wheat,” he said.
The Agricultural Quarantine approved the shipment of Indian wheat– amounting to 55,000 tons – after examining it at one of the international laboratories approved by the European Union.
The Plant Quarantine also conducted a thorough examination of all wheat quantities before and during loading on the boat from the Indian port of Kandla.
In March India had been in final talks to start exporting wheat to Egypt, the world’s largest importer, after the Ukraine conflict upset global supplies.
India is the second largest wheat producing country in the world, with the largest purchaser of Indian wheat in 2020-2021 being Bangladesh.
Egypt, Lebanon and Libya are among the Arab countries that depend the most on wheat from Russia and Ukraine, while Egypt ranks first globally in importing wheat.
Ukraine provides food for about 400 million people around the world. (UNI)