Brasília, June 16, 2003 (Agência Brasil - ABr) - Beginning today, the Federal Inspection Service (SIF), of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, and Supply, will begin to issue the new models of health certificates for meat exports to the Russian market.

With the new models, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul will resume pork sales, suspended since December, 2002, and May, 2003, respectively, as a result of occurrences of Aujeszky disease.

Russian officials accepted the Brazilian proposal to ban exports only from municipalities where cases of the disease were registered. These municipalities will be taken off the restricted list after 12 months without new cases.

With respect to sales of beef - suspended since April, as a result of an outbreak of Scrapie in sheep in the state of Paraná - the Ministry obtained the agreement of Russia to remove the requirement for certifying cattle, since Scrapie does not occur in this species.

For the past 12 months, Russian health authorities have also been requiring certification of the absence of gall bladder disease in all of national territory. By the new agreement, this requirement will only be applied to states where the disease has been detected during this period. (DAS)