What is animal health?
The Animal Health Service imposes strict import controls on all live animals, animal products not intended for human use, veterinary drugs, and animal health articles.
Animal Health also carries out controls on live animals, animal products, animal health articles and animal feedstuffs.
It is therefore an inspection service managed by the Border Inspection Service (SIF) and a process carried out at customs.
The Animal Health Service is managed by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food.
Animal health is under the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAPA), which is responsible for both animals and their foodstuffs and for goods of animal origin.
Foreign trade control is the responsibility of the General Directorate of Agricultural Production Health, under the General Secretariat of Agriculture and Food.
All the delegations of the Spanish Autonomous Communities throughout the country have functional areas in charge of animal health inspections.
You can also go to the European Commission’s website for additional information on Animal Health control and inspection measures.
TRACES (Trade Control and Expert System) is the trans-European veterinary health network for the notification, certification and control of imports, exports and trade of animals and animal products for the European Union.
The certifications required to export or import
Animal Health is responsible for ensuring that animals and animal products not intended for human consumption, as well as other items intended for animal feed, arrive safely.
You may need to acquire several papers and certifications in connection with the Animal Health inspection to comply with this obligation.
To transfer live animals, animal products, food, or feed to nations other than the United States, you must acquire the Export Health Certificate.
Normally, you must obtain this document from the nation you are importing from, and it will be general or more particular depending on whether the country you are delivering to has unique criteria.
If you wish to export an animal product, you will need the Export Health Certificate, which must be obtained after registration in the CEXGAN system.
Since these guidelines only serve to better protect your commodity, we encourage you to do your research and find out what regulations, certifications and paperwork are required in the nation to which you are shipping your commodity.
You must first register in the CEXGAN system to apply for the certificate online. You can also find more information about the papers you will need to pass the Animal Health inspection on this platform.
However, you should keep in mind that in certain intra-community operations of live animals, semen, ova and embryos, the Export Health Certificate is also required.
Livestock imports must also comply with certain paperwork and certifications, which the Animal Health Service will request from you depending on the animal product you are importing.
This information is available as follows:
- Common Veterinary Entry Document (CVED): for live animals and any product derived from an animal not intended for human consumption (feed and non-feed).
- Common Entry Document: for goods of non-animal origin.
- Certification of Origin: a certificate describing the origin of animals and animal-derived goods, regardless of whether they are intended for human consumption (feed and non-feed).
- Importer registration: live animals, animal-derived goods, and feedstuffs, as well as non-animal feedstuffs and medicines, require importer registration.
- Authorization to import medicines from the Spanish Medicines Agency.
Where are animal health inspections required?
Ports and airports are the most frequent points of entry of products into Spanish territory.
Therefore, these infrastructures have adequately equipped facilities for the inspection of goods and animals by Animal Health.
All Spanish ports and airports with a significant traffic of goods have the so-called Border Inspection Posts (BIP), which are facilities approved by the European Union for the documentary and physical inspection of all products.
The most significant BIPs are located at Madrid-Barajas and Barcelona-El Prat airports, as well as in the BIP regions of the ports of Barcelona, Algeciras, Valencia and Bilbao.
Do we manage your Animal Health application?
At Connecta we are customs experts and we can help you whether you are exporting or importing goods of animal origin not intended for human use, products intended for animal feed, live animals or any item that must pass an Animal Health inspection.
We can help you as Connecta has access to the European Union’s TRACES software.
Our team of experts can advise you on the certifications and paperwork you will need to submit to import or export these types of goods.
Connecta can take care of these processes for you, saving you time and money.
Connecta has two channels for communication and document transmission:
- By mail to: info@miconnecta.com
- You can also use our form to Connect with us.