In order to support the Dominican agricultural export sector in the development of a modern sanitary and phytosanitary regulatory framework, the Trade Safe Project (TraSa), financed by the Department of Agriculture of the United States Embassy, signed a working agreement with the Center for Agricultural and Forestry Development (CEDAF).
The partnership between CEDAF and the project, implemented by the International Executive Service Corps (IESC), aims to develop the capacity of agricultural producers and export companies to comply with national and international sanitary and phytosanitary standards, according to a press release.
The director of the TraSa Project, Brian Rudert, said that CEDAF, since its inception, has been an important and strong ally for both the Ministry of Agriculture and the entire agricultural sector.
“Our project wants to leverage this important relationship to help producers and exporters, as well as the Ministry, by improving the coverage and depth of the impact of its sanitary and phytosanitary services,” Rudert said.
“We are honored by the trust placed by IESC in CEDAF in this undertaking, which will require urgent responses to the challenges facing the country in the sanitary and phytosanitary area,” said Santiago Tejada, president of CEDAF, who recalled that a similar mission was happily accomplished at the conclusion of the Exporta Calidad Program last year.
With this agreement, the TraSa project and CEDAF will train agricultural export producers in Good Agricultural Practices (GAP), as well as in the requirements of the United States Food Safety Act (FSMA) and traceability, using the methodology of Farmer Field Schools (FFS),
CEDAF will also support TraSa with the implementation of a grant program for agricultural research on different topics, including post-harvest production, integrated pest management, among others.
The mission of the TraSa Project is to improve efficiency, coordination, trade transparency, and food and agricultural product safety in the Dominican Republic through the support of science-based sanitary and phytosanitary measures, standards and regulations and risk analysis.
