S. Korea sees slight rise in infested farm, forestry imports in 2008

SEOUL, Jan. 20 (Yonhap) -- South Korea's state quarantine body said Tuesday it
returned or destroyed 28,000 shipments and packages of pest-infested
agricultural and forestry imports in 2008, up 6 percent from the year before.
The number is 18.5 percent of the 150,600 cases or 24 million tons worth of
imports checked overall, the National Plant Quarantine Service (NPQS) said.
In 2007, the country checked 161,300 import shipments, of which 26,500 were found
to be infested with pests that could wreak havoc on the country's ecosystem and
agricultural production. Of these, 24,900 required decontamination and cleaning,
while 1,600 shipments had to be destroyed.
"There was a drop in the total brought into the country due to a rise in import
prices and weak domestic demand caused by food safety concerns," said an NPQS
inspector. He added that while there was a drop in imports checked, more detailed
examinations caused the number of detections to go up slightly.
The NPQS said that of the pest-infested products found last year, 26,200 cases,
equal to 2.6 million tons, were allowed to clear customs after being cleaned,
with 1,600 cases or 16,000 tons being destroyed.
Most of the contaminated products were bananas, pineapples, oranges, frozen
peppers, peach seeds and mushrooms.
The service under the agriculture ministry said 44 new fungi, viruses and insects
were detected for the first time last year.
yonngong@yna.co.kr
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