By a Staff Reporter

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MoARD) last week warned coffee exporters of carrying out inspection of chemical residue levels in coffee by themselves or with another company without the prior permission of MoARD.

In a letter addressed to coffee exporters, Yakob Yala, Minister of State of MoARD, said that the government had stablished its own network of laboratories working in partnership with it for inspecting chemical residue levels in coffee. Therefore, coffee samples must be inspected in one of these laboratories following submission of request to the Ministry by the exporter.

The official warned coffee exporters that if they violated the procedure of chemical residue levels inspection set by the MoARD, they could face legal charges.

Results of chemical residue levels inspections carried out so far were done without the Ministry's approval and by companies and laboratories which had no partnership agreement to work with the MoARD, he said.

It is to be recalled that the Japanese government recently rejected Ethiopian coffee on the grounds that the beans contained chemical residue at levels above the maximum level tolerated by Japan's food sanitation law.

However, the ministry in its letter to the Japanese government last month said that the ministry and coffee exporters find it hard to believe that the Ethiopian coffee in question violated the Japan's food sanitation law because, first and foremost, the chemical pesticides reported to have been found in the Ethiopian fresh coffee beans above the law are not registered for use in coffee or in any other crop in Ethiopia.

The ministry also said that the notice by the Japanese inspection services has been given due regard by the ministry regardless of what the ministry believes, and would do everything to find a solution to the incidence.