Turkey: Amendment Proposed on Rice Regulations in Turkey
The Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock (MinFAL) announced a draft Turkish Food Codex Communiqué on Rice which allows for up to a five percent threshold for unintentional blending, up from a zero tolerance level. According to Turkish market sources, retail sector will be happy for this increased tolerance up to five percent of a different rice variety in rice package. With this realistic threshold, the government can now crack down on the problem of blending of cheaper rice varieties because they can sort out the difference between unintentional blending which can happen during production, transport, and processing at under five percent, and purposeful blending and mislabeling of varieties/qualities/origins which has become an issue. Rice is a mainstay in the Turkish diet, and the United States is consistently a top supplier of rice to Turkey.
