Heeralall Sukdeo, owner of Sukdeo and Sons Fishing Enterprise, says that local companies have suffered significant losses since they can no longer export catfish to the United States of America and he predicts even more severe ramifications if measures are not put in place to address the ban.
The United Stated Department of Agriculture (USDA) has implemented a ban on catfish imports from Guyana and other countries. The exporters from the various countries are required by the US Food and Safety Inspection Services (FSIS) to provide documentation to verify that their respective country’s inspection system is equivalent to the US standards, or that the degree of its public health system is equivalent to the USA’s.
However, while the local authorities have attempted to comply with the request, the country has fallen short of the US standards in three areas: the presence of inspectors; insufficient documentation detailing verification of each step in the sanitation and Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP); and insufficient documentation specifying how the industry manages adulterated (tainted) catfish products.
