The import health certificates required for imported products of animal origin, including fishery products and live bivalve molluscs, are changing.
Consignments of fishery products and live bivalves arriving at the EU border, or landed directly into an EU port, will need to be accompanied by certificates in the new format. Old style certificates issued on or after 14 December 2019 will not be accepted. The Regulation that provides the specimen certificates is Regulation (EU) 2019/628.
Regulation (EU) 2019/628 provides new certificates for:
New certificates made available for the first time are:
The notes in Annex II of the Regulation explain how the certificates should be completed.
Background to the legislation
The Regulation provides in one place all the specimen health certificate for products of animal origin for human consumption, and instructions on how they should be completed. The certificates needed to be adapted to tie in with the Information Management System for Official Controls (IMSOC). Article 4 prepares the way for electronic certification with electronic signatures. Also, the health information sections in the certificates had to be changed to take account of new legislation, such as new legislation relating to official controls.
Replacement certificates
Article 5 lays down rules for replacement certificates where there are errors in the initial certificate or where the original certificate has been damaged or lost. Replacement certificates may be accepted only in the case of errors which are clearly administrative in nature, such as transposed numbers in the container number or seal number, spelling errors in addresses, or spelling errors in product descriptions. In particular, replacement certificates shall not modify information concerning the identification, traceability and health guarantees of consignments.
