Mozambique: Customs seize four tons of contraband chicken in Ressano border – Watch

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mozambique: Customs seize four tons of contraband chicken in Ressano border – Watch

4:19 CAT | 16 Sep 2020

Photo: Domingo

Customs authorities at the Ressano Garcia border post in Maputo province on Sunday seized four tons of frozen chicken hidden in the false bottom of a truck from South Africa.

“At first glance the truck seemed empty, but they [the carriers] had created a false bottom, where they hid the chicken,” Customs director in Maputo Leonel Vasco told Television of Mozambique (TVM) yesterday.

The smuggled chicken further represented a danger to public health, the authorities say, because the truck had neither a refrigeration system nor an international phytosanitary certificate.

“The Ministry of Agriculture has the necessary mechanisms to carry out laboratory tests and verify whether or not the chicken is fit for human consumption,” Leonel Vasco said.

Vasco added that the same truck, again carrying chicken, had been seized more than twice already during inspection activities this year.

From January to August this year, 170 tons of chicken have been seized in Maputo province, representing a potential loss of nine million meticais (€106,000) in lost import duties.