The Municipal Affairs Bureau (IAM) announced in a statement yesterday that it will maintain its ban on food imports from 10 Japanese prefectures.
The statement identified the 10 prefectures as Chiba, Fukushima, Gunma, Ibaraki, Miyagi, Nagano, Niigata, Saitama, Tochigi and Tokyo, from which imports remain restricted under the Chinese mainland and local ban, despite the mainland’s recent conditional resumption of some Japanese aquatic product imports.
According to the statement, the banned products include perishable foods, animal-derived products, sea salt, and seaweed—covering vegetables, fruit, dairy products, seafood, meat, poultry eggs, and related processed items.
The announcement follows a Sunday statement by the General Administration of Customs (GACC) in Beijing, which allowed limited imports of Japanese seafood except from the 10 prefectures. Exporters must now reapply for registration, providing health certificates, radiation compliance proofs, and origin documentation. Live aquatic animals require additional farm and packaging facility re-registration, the announcement said.
According to the IAM statement, Macau’s ban, initially imposed on August 24, 2023, applies to all agricultural and food products from the 10 Japanese prefectures. The Municipal Affairs Bureau and Macau Customs Service will continue to conduct radiation checks on all Japanese food imports. As of June 22, the handheld radiation instrument detection involved 193,000 samples and lab tests for 3,700 samples, the statement said, pointing out that do abnormalities had been detected.
The bureau said that enhanced retail inspections would continue in order to ensure compliance, reaffirming that the restrictions align with precautionary measures for food safety.
This file photo taken on September 1, 2023 shows fishery workers unloading seafood caught in offshore trawl fishing at the Japanese port of Matsukawaura in the city of Soma, Fukushima prefecture, about a week after the country began discharging treated wastewater from the TEPCO Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. – JIJI Press/AFP
