Armenia bans use of hormones in feed production

Armenia’s Ministry of Agriculture plans to ban the use of hormonal additives in feed and foods, a new draft of the “On food safety” bill, presented to the Armenian Parliament by Minister of Agriculture Sergo Karapetyan, reveals. It is also reported that the ban will apply to all other artificial animal growth stimulants as well.

In a statement, representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture said: “Our poultry farmers now have the opportunity to use various additives and premixes for animal feed production.”

“There are also available a variety of hormones, which in our country were in fact unknown to the feed production industry until a few years ago. As a result, many farmers began to use them vigorously.”

“That is the cause of our concern: today there are many studies that prove the harm these hormones present to consumers’ health,” the Ministry said. Similarly in imported products, if evidence of hormones is found, the products will be destroyed.

Too soft

For many members of the Armenian Parliament said the adopted draft bill was too soft – many also proposed extending the ban to include genetically modified products. In terms of feed production Armenia is the fastest growing country in the CIS after Kazakhstan. Soon Armenia will launch a major investment project on the promotion of livestock development.

Part of this project includes plans for the construction of a feed plant capable of producing 160,000 tons of feed per year, as well as the contruction of more than a dozen smaller feed production enterprises. The total investment for the development of feed production according to rough estimations will be about $20 million, a record amount for Armenia.