Summary of newsmakers of the previous day – 8.3.2006

More than thousand foodstuffs are „Klasa“

In total 1030 foodstuffs of domestic provenance will be entitled after this day to use the quality mark KLASA. At this year’s jubilee 25th year of international food fair Salima in Brno the Minister of Agriculture Jan Mládek licensed the certificate KLASA to other 186 products from 33 food producers. The most honoured products are from the category meat and meat products, milk and milk products and delicatessen.

Court violated the way of sugar quota allotment

The Constitutional Court has violated the government bylaw by means of which a sugar quota had been allotted. According to the Court the government made a mistake within enforcement of it. Exact reasons of the violation have not been clear yet; the Court starts to explain its arguments.

In last weeks prices of poultry fell

Ostrava: Producers are afraid of that a possible panic about bird flu will have a great influence on customers and the demand for poultry meat will decrease significantly. The Minister of Agriculture, Jan Mládek, expresses similar fears, too. According to the spokeswoman of Tesco, Jana Matoušková, the fall in demand has not shown yet in these stores. Hypernova and Albert stores, which belong to the company Ahold, have similar experience. “Occurrence of bird flu had not shown itself in the poultry meat consumption for a long time. As late as in the last month the consumption decreased slightly. However, also prices of poultry meat fall. For example the price of chicken breast steak decreased from almost 120 to 110 crowns last month”, the spokeswoman of the company Ahold CR, Kateřina Černá, reported.

Stamping helped clear the market

Stamping of spirits helped very quickly to clear the market from tax-less, so also false alcoholic drinks. Czech liqueur producers agreed on it and it is confirmed also by a higher collection of consumption tax. It could bring decrease in takings to legal producers. “I suppose that about eighty percent of “black” goods have really disappeared”, said Josef Nejedlý, the director of liqueur producer Fruko-Schulz in Jindřichův Hradec. He belonged among the critics of spirit stamping. They considered it as non-systemic. However, since November his firm has produced in two shifts.