Russia bans American corn and soybeans

Russia has banned imports of soybeans and corn from the United States starting from February 15, Assistant to Head of Russia's Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance (Rosselkhoznadzor) Alexey Alekseenko told Russian news agency TASS on Wednesday.

"Restrictions will be imposed on imports starting from February 15," Alekseenko said, adding that "they [the U.S.] have to establish a system to ensure safety of products imported to Russia," according to TASS. The period of the restrictions has not been specified.

In late January 2016 the regulator said that it might ban imports of the U.S. corn and soybeans due to contamination of products by quarantine objects and the risk of delivery of GMO products to Russia, according to the report.

According to the agency, the corn imported from the U.S. is often infected with dry rot of maize. In addition, according to the Russian watchdog, corn can be used for transgenic crops in Russia. The potential damage from import and spread of quarantine objects on the territory of Russia is estimated at 10-15 billion rubles ($126 million – 189 million) annually.

UAC Information Center by information UNIAN