Kosovo and Bulgaria's authorities are taking measures to synchronize their food safety requirements in order to provide for Bulgarian food exports to Kosovo, the new republic's Agriculture Minister Blerand Stavileci has said.

Stavileci met Wednesday in Prishtina with Bulgarian Agriculture Minister Miroslav Naydenov, as the youngest Balkan country is in desperate need of grocery items and produce to make up for market shortages after the government imposed in July an embargo on products coming from Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The crisis emerged over the latters' refusal to acknowledge Kosovo's Customs stamps as an independent country and banning the import of Kosovo-made goods. Until now, Kosovo imported food products from Serbia valued at EUR 300 M with 80% of them being food.

Last week, the Kosovo Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Trade and Industry Mimosa Kusari-Lila met Naydenov, while on an official visit to Sofia, to explain the situation.

"We are interested in the import of foods from Bulgaria and the increase of the bilateral trade. Besides, Kosovo is also looking for opportunities for foreign investments. We hope to create joint ventures with Bulgarian participation," Kosovo's Agriculture Minister Stavileci said after his meeting with Naydenov Wednesday, as quoted by the press service of the Bulgarian Agriculture Ministry.

"The two countries can cooperate in veterinary medicine, forestry, land cultivation. Bulgaria can provide Kosovo with wheat, vegetable oil, milk products, poultry, eggs, flour, sugar," Naydenov explained in Prishtina.

The specific steps that the two countries will take in order to enable the Bulgarian food imports to Kosovo will focus on on eliminating the administrative barriers. Both ministers promised that the Bulgarian Food Safety Agency and the Kosovo Veterinary Control Agency were starting work on the existing issues.

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