Bhubaneswar, Marine Products Export Development Authority (MPEDA) opened its refurbished Quality Control Laboratory at Nayapalli in this city, ensuring high-precision tests using state-of-the-art equipment that can also detect banned antibiotics.
The facility, which has shifted to Raptani Bhavan was inaugurated by MPEDA Chairman Mr K S Srinivas on Saturday, will provide facilitate testing of antibiotic residue in farmed shrimps as per the regulatory requirements prescribed by the importing countries and the Export Inspection Council (EIC) of India as well. The lab will also issue PHT (pre-harvest test) certificates to aquaculture farmers as per the regulatory requirements for export of farmed shrimps to the European Union.
The lab will pursue accreditation by the National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories (NABL) as per ISO/IEC 17025:2017 and approval by the Export Inspection Council (EIC) soon after inauguration.
Mr Srinivas highlighted the lab’s “strategic location”, as it ensures processing and export of residue-free shrimps produced in not just Odisha but neighbouring West Bengal as well. “Together, the two states contribute to 11 per cent of the country’s cultured shrimp production,” he pointed out. “This adds to the relevance of the new lab.”
The Nayapalli laboratory has sophisticated devices such as liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometers, high-performance liquid chromatographs and automated ELISA reader. The test parameters include nitrofuran metabolites, chloramphenicol, nitroimidazole. sulphonamides, quinolones, flouroquinolones and tetracyclines with 4-epimers.
The inaugural ceremony over video-conferencing was held in the presence of Fisheries and Animal Resource Development Department Commissioner-cum-Secretary Mr R Raghu Prasad IFS, MPEDA Director Dr M Karthikeyan, MPEDA Director (Marketing) Mr T Dolasankar IOFS, MPEDA Member Mr Aditya Dash, Seafood Exporters Association of India Managing Committee Member Tara Ranjan Patnaik, its Odisha Regional President Dr Kamlesh Mishra and Mr. B Sreekumar, Adviser, MPEDA.
Mr Srinivas noted that Odisha has shown an average annual growth of 13 per cent in the export of marine products over the past decade: from 21,311 metric tonnes (worth Rs 800 crore) in 2011-12 to 66,654 MT (Rs 3,243 crore in 2019-20.
Odisha is India’s third-largest state’s producing cultured shrimp, with a 6.2 per cent share in the country’s total shrimp production. When it comes to cultured shrimps of the exotic vannamei variety, the state has registered an average of 52% yearly growth in production: from 100 MT in 2012-13 to 44,007 MT in 2019-20.
Odisha’s seafood finds major markets in China (37 per cent) and USA (36 per cent). The other countries that buy the products are Japan and Southeast nations besides European.
To guarantee quality seafood for world-wide export to consumers conscious of health and quality, MPEDA has set up labs at Bhimavaram, Nellore (both in Andhra Pradesh) and Porbandar (Gujarat) besides Bhubaneswar and in the headquarter city of Kochi (Kerala). These have facilities to test seafood samples for heavy metals, dyes, pesticides and antibiotic residues using advanced technology. Also, MPEDA has established 12 ELISA screening labs for monitoring residues of banned antibiotics from primary production to processing plants for export.
On Saturday, MPEDA also opened a Quality Control Laboratory in Porbandar, facilitating tests for seafood processors and exporters to confirm product safety as per international regulatory requirements.
MPEDA, formed in 1972 under the Union Ministry of Commerce, is a coordinating agency with central and state-level establishments engaged in fishery production and allied activities.
