On Tuesday, 9 December, the Czech Confederation of Commerce and Tourism arranged a meeting attended by representatives of retail chains and supervisory bodies. The meeting was also attended by the management of the Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority which checks food safety and quality in retail chains. On this occasion, Director General Jakub Šebesta informed the attenders of a new initiative of CAFIA which aim is to ensure better awareness of consumers. The Inspection Authority decided to release periodically a chart of retail chains. This chart will be drafted according to results of CAFIA inspections.

The Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority revealed wine of Hungarian origin at which laboratory analyses showed addition of water, at least of 52%. The wine in question was found in Kaufland. Namely, it was Rizling vlašský minöségi cuvée bor (dry white wine, batch L080610).

The Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority has started inspections of half-fermented wine in August of this year. Inspectors checked appropriate labelling of half-fermented wine, hygiene conditions at the place of sale as well as documentation related to the sale of half-fermented wine. This way, the inspectors carried out several hundreds of inspections in whole the Czech Republic.

Within its responsibilities, the Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority is consistently focused on inspections of honey. In addition to compliance with quality requirements, the Authority also verifies whether honey is adulterated or not. In recent days the Food Inspection Authority revealed eight cases of adulterated honey.

The Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority banned last week production of delicatessen products in premises of Jiří Dušek in Vrdy near Čáslav due to detection of Listeria monocytogenes.

The Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority has further results of analyses focused on melamine content in dangerous foodstuffs available. They are foodstuffs originating from China or other Asian countries and containing milk component of any form. However, presence of this chemical substance with exceeding limit was not detected in any of further 11 samples.

The Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority banned production of delicatessen in manufacturing premises of Jiří Dušek in Vrdy u Čáslavi due to Listeria monocytogenes detection. The company in question is of local importance and distributes products only in close region.

The Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority was notified through the European Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed that candies White Rabbit originating from China, in which limit exceeding amount of melamine had been detected earlier, were imported into the CR. Importer from the Netherlands had distributed these candies into 14 European countries far earlier than the European Commission established protective measures on the borders. Until now, the Dutch Authority for control of foodstuffs completed the list of all purchasers.

In response to the case of milk products contaminated by melamin that had appeared in China, already in September the Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority began to focus its controls more on foodstuffs of Chinese origin containing a milk ingredient. Since that time the inspectors have been detecting if these foodstuffs cannot be found in common shops. At the same time more controls have been carried out in Asian market halls and shops specialised in Asian foodstuffs. So far about 350 controls have been carried out.

In connection with the case of Chinese milk which was proved to have been contaminated by the chemical substance melamin, on the 26 th September 2008 the European Commission decided to tighten up the measures that are aimed at protection of the European market from these dangerous foodstuffs.