55 tons of illegal caviar found in Astrakhan region

Almost half of the total amount of illegal caviar in Russia has been detected in the Astrakhan region, which topped the rating of regions by the amount of goods of unknown origin. This was reported to Izvestia on December 25 by the press service of the Center for the Development of Advanced Technologies (CDPT, the state operator of the labeling system "Honest Mark"), which conducted a study of data from September to November 2024.

"The digital labeling system made it possible to identify more than 55 tons of illegal products in the region, which is almost half (47%) of the total amount of illegal caviar detected across the country. In addition to Astrakhan, the list of regions - leaders in terms of caviar of unknown origin included the Sakhalin and Moscow regions, as well as Moscow and St. Petersburg. In total, illegal caviar was found in 22 subjects of the Russian Federation", - said the CRPT.

Nevertheless, the most violators were in the capital, where caviar of unknown origin was found at 24 market participants. The second place in the number of violations is occupied by the Moscow region, where illegal product was found in 12 retail outlets.

The Center for Development of Advanced Technologies specified that labeling allows to detect not only large, but also very small batches of counterfeit: for example, in St. Petersburg 150 g of packaged illegal caviar was found, and in Moscow - 200 g.

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As the New Year approaches, the number of detected caviar of unknown origin has increased many times over: in November, the number of detected caviar more than doubled compared to the previous month.

According to Revaz Yusupov, Deputy Director General of CRPT, the "Honest Mark" labeling system continues to successfully identify potentially dangerous products for consumers and prevent the spread of illegal products.

"Thanks to labeling, over the past three months we managed to identify more than 116 tons of caviar made from unknown raw materials, which indicates possible cases of product adulteration. In addition, labeling helps to bring production out of the shadows: for eight months, 78 enterprises that previously did not report to the state have been removed from the illegal turnover," Yusupov explained to Izvestia.

Earlier, on December 17, it was reported that Russians for the incomplete 2024, from January to November, bought more than 5 million kg of red caviar. This is 12% more in volume compared to the same period in 2023. This is stated in the results of the research of the loyalty program "X5 Club". At the same time, the volume of purchased black caviar decreased by 16%, to 99 thousand kg.