Russia's war of aggression in Ukraine is causing - among numerous other aspects - bottlenecks in the availability of various goods. Due to the blockade of the seaports in Ukraine, as many goods as possible are now to be reallocated to roads, railways or inland waterway vessels. However, certification of these means of transport, which is mandatory at QS for the transport of feed, is currently not available to a sufficient extent.
In order to maintain the supply situation with primary agricultural products, especially grain, and feed from Ukraine, QS has created an exemption at short notice. Thus, as of now, the application of a gate-keeper regulation is possible for the following transport service providers of feed and primary agricultural products within and from Ukraine:
- Gate-keeping for non-certified road transport
- Gate-keeping for non-certified inland waterway transportation
- Gate-keeping for non-certified charterers for rail transport
The new gate-keeper regulation, which is time-limited until 30.03.2023, can be found in the currently revised Annex 9.2 Gate-Keeping regulation to the QS Guideline Feed Sector.
The extended Gate-Keeper regulation allows QS certified purchasers of feed to also use non-certified transport service providers and to assume responsibility for the quality assurance of these companies themselves. Through this scheme, Ukrainian goods can quickly and pragmatically be brought into the QS scheme as well without a reduction in quality assurance. The precise requirements for the implementation of the Gate-Keeping regulation can be found in Appendix 9.2.
