Company fined S$20,000 over illegal import of food products from Indonesia

SINGAPORE: An organization has been fined S$20,000 for illegally importing assorted food products from Indonesia, the Singapore Food Agency (SFA) and Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) stated on Wednesday (Oct 27).

The director of Reliable Transport & Logistic Services, Hardinizam Khairuddin Muhammad, was additionally fined S$15,000 for failing to train due diligence to stop the offence from being dedicated.

Consignments of “unknown meat products” imported by the corporate have been detected by ICA officers at Changi Airfreight Centre on Oct 21. They didn't have a sound import allow.

SFA discovered that the corporate had illegally imported about 735kg of meat and seafood products, 10kg of contemporary vegatables and fruits, in addition to 503kg of processed food products from Indonesia.

The illegal consignments have been seized.

The authorities stated food imports in Singapore should meet SFA’s necessities. Food can solely be imported by licensed importers, and each consignment have to be declared and accompanied with a sound import allow.

“Illegally imported food products are of unknown sources and can pose a food safety risk. In addition, meat and meat products can only be imported from accredited sources in approved countries that comply with Singapore’s food safety standards and requirements,” they added.

Those discovered responsible of importing meat products illegally from unapproved sources face a nice of as much as S$50,000, as much as two years’ jail, or each.

Those who illegally import contemporary vegatables and fruits with no allow will be fined as much as S$10,000, jailed as much as three years, or each.

The offence of illegally importing processed food carries a nice of as much as S$1,000.

ICA stated it's going to proceed to conduct safety checks to detect and deter smuggling makes an attempt, as related concealment strategies might also be utilized by terrorists to smuggle safety objects into the nation.

SFA added that it'll additionally proceed to work carefully with border management businesses to discourage illegal import throughout Singapore’s borders.