- Partial Amendment for 『Public Notice on Import Permit for Aquatic Animal Pathogenic Agents』 takes effect from August 2 -

The Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries (MOF; Minister MOON, Seong-Hyeok) and National Fishery Products Quality Management Service (NFQS; Director General Yang, Dong-Yeob) announced that 『Public Notice on Import Permit for Aquatic Animal Pathogenic Agents』 is partially amended in order to enhance the safety control for imported aquatic animal pathogenic agents, going into effect from August 2.

Domestic universities and research laboratories have imported aquatic animal pathogenic agents every year to develop diagnostic method and do research on medicine development so that damages caused by farmed aquatic animals’ diseases could be prevented.

The number of application for pathogenic agents import: 3 (2017) – 4 (2018) – 6 (2019) – 5 (2020)

Aquatic Animal Health Code published by the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) states that aquatic animal pathogens, which are transported overseas, should be packaged to make sure that they are not leaked. And countries like Canada put in place safety control rules that allow the use of aquatic animal pathogens only at the facility approved by the competent authority.

World Organization for Animal Health (=Offices International des Epizootie): International organization that has a mandate to improve animal health and welfare throughout the world. It does research on aquatic and terrestrial animals’ diseases and provide international standards (found from France in 1924).

However, Korea only has a regulation that evaluates the initial importer of the aquatic animal pathogens, meaning that it is difficult to continue controlling the imported pathogens because there is no official process to check how they are handled afterwards.

What to evaluate: professional staff, necessary equipment installed, proper amount of importation, proper ways to control pathogenic agents, whether imported pathogens were leaked before, etc.

In addition to that, the industry has continuously requested the government to create an official procedure through which aquatic animal pathogens could be distributed from the initial importer to others—distribution to the third party. In the circumstances, MOF and NFQS have amended some parts of 『Public Notice on Import Permit for Aquatic Animal Pathogenic Agents』.

The amended Public Notice states that the imported pathogens should be packaged to be transported to prevent any leakage and also contains the procedure to check whether they are under the safety control after being imported. According to the amended Public Notice, the status of the imported pathogens should be reported to the competent authorities once a year. And when the pathogenic agents are in no need of possession or out of control due to the facility’s closedown, the disposal of the pathogens should be reported to the competent authorities as well.

Plus, the amendment includes new procedures and standards that allow the distribution of the imported pathogens to the third party—except for commercial products—unless it is against the patent right or copyright. The third party receiving the pathogens from the importer should also report the status of the distributed pathogens once a year for the follow-up management.

It is expected that the amendment of 『Public Notice on Import Permit for Aquatic Animal Pathogenic Agents』 helps prevent possible problems caused by the leakage of pathogens that ends up harming the domestic aquatic ecosystem. Imported for the purpose of research, the pathogenic agents are expected to be made the most of in Korea’s aquatic animal disease research thanks greatly to the amendment.

Director General Yang stated that, “The amendment for the follow-up management of imported pathogens will hopefully contribute to strengthening the control system for aquatic animal disease research. NFQS will try our best to take a good care of and implement the system well.”