A Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) health alert was triggered following a notification issued on March 4, 2024, by the Spanish authorities, reporting the detection of the hepatitis A virus in strawberries imported from Morocco. Since then, the incident has caused an uproar in the Spanish and Moroccan press and has been "instrumentalized in a smear campaign orchestrated against Moroccan producers," says Amine Bennani, President of the Moroccan Association of Red Fruit Producers.
Bennani recounts a hectic week after the RASFF notification: "After the Spanish notification, ONSSA (Moroccan health authorities) immediately identified the grower in question, as well as the packing station, thanks to a relentless tracing system. The grower and the packing station underwent extensive sampling, covering all stages of fruit handling, from seedlings to irrigation, to greenhouses, to inputs, to the packing station. All samples were negative, and neither hepatitis A nor norovirus was detected."
The producers' representative continued, "ONSSA has gone one step further, imposing a screening of all Moroccan production for traces of these viruses as early as Wednesday. Samples were taken from all farms and packing stations and analyzed in ONSSA laboratories. The results came back after 24 hours, and no traces of hepatitis A or norovirus were detected in the Moroccan strawberries."
"We don't question the veracity of the Spanish authorities' notification," says Bennani."This may be an accidental and isolated incident, probably a contamination by an ill worker during transport. But this is by no means a widespread contamination, not even at the level of a single farm or packing station."
While the producers' association does not deny the Spanish notification, it accuses the Spanish media and producers of being behind a smear campaign targeting the Moroccan industry: "As soon as the RASFF issued the notification, we saw the Spanish media seize on the subject and multiply television broadcasts, demonstrations, and even use the incident to justify earlier attacks on Moroccan trucks. Clearly, the Moroccan strawberry industry is the victim of a Spanish smear campaign. Given the speed with which this campaign is being orchestrated, one wonders if it wasn't even predetermined".
But the producers' representative reassures: "We're continuing to do business as before. Our customers continue to place their trust in us and are well aware of the rigor of the Moroccan authorities and the ONSSA. Moreover, many of our customers in Europe, the Gulf countries, and elsewhere have analyzed the shipments they received last week and found no contamination."
At the end of the week, a detail was added to the controversy surrounding the contaminated strawberries, to the astonishment of industry players in Spain. The contaminated batch was imported from a company based in Huelva, exposing a practice decried in both Spain and Morocco, namely the redistribution of Moroccan strawberries as if they were produced in Spain.Bennani comments, "If this is true, it's something we don't encourage and don't like. On the contrary, we're in favor of greater traceability and better promotion of Moroccan origin."
And Bennani concludes: "It's interesting to see that this small detail betrays the state of mind of our Spanish colleagues, who value the quality of Moroccan strawberries until it's time to smear them with unfounded accusations."
For more information:
Bennani Amine
Moroccan Association of Soft Fruit Producers
Tel.: +212661243424
Email: phytoloukkos@gmail.com