Nearly two weeks after lifting the ban on rice imports from India, Russia has said that it wants to inspect Indian laboratories that test and certify the grain for safety and quality.

The Russian government had banned imports of rice, peanut and sesame seed from India with effect from May 1, 2007 due to the alleged detection of pesticides in the rice consignment and contained Aflatoxin B1 and metal foreign matter in the Indian peanut and sesame seed.

But the Russian government agreed to lift the ban on import of these commodities on July 20.

Howeverm Moscow has insisted that shipments of rice have to be accompanied by an import quarantine permission and a safety and quality certificate issued by the Shri Ram Institute for Industrial Research and Phytosanitary Certificate.

While it is the only Indian institution providing these certificates, the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority has submitted a list of accredited laboratories that can issue safety and quality benchmarks for rice exports from India.

A Commerce Ministry official said that a team of Russian government officials want to visit India to inspect these laboratories to consider the admissibility of safety and quality certificates issued by them.

"We have no issues. We are ready to show our testing laboratories to the Russian authorities," the official said.