The scientific study undertaken by the Belgium based firm Fratini Vergano has proved beyond reasonable doubt that kava has nothing to do with liver toxicity or heart related disease.
The scientific study undertaken by the Belgium based firm Fratini Vergano has proved beyond reasonable doubt that kava has nothing to do with liver toxicity or heart related disease.
This was confirmed by Vanuatu's Ambassador to the European Union, Roy Mickey Joy, in an interview with Vanuatu Info Online.
“I confirm that just this week, the consultant of the Brussels (Belgium) based Fratini Vergano Law Firm has confirmed the conclusion of the kava study undertaken for the last six months. The confirmation was made this week while we’re in Barbados”, Ambassador Joy said.
Head of the TBT-PMU, Junior Lodge of Jamaica who participated as a panelist at the 2nd Caribbean Agribusiness Forum in Bridgetown, Barbados confirmed this information to Ambassador Joy.
In a statement at the Caribbean Forum, Lodge acknowledged Ambassador Joy as the 'Kava King' in Brussels because the Vanuatu diplomat based in Belgium has made substantial contribution in advancing the Pacific Kava dossier within the EU and ACP realms.
Ambassador Joy conveyed his appreciation to the Ministry of Agriculture in Vanuatu, particularly to the European Union and the African-Caribbean- Pacific Group of states (ACP) for making available the funding of € 250 000 (around VT 30 million) through the Technical Barriers to Trade - Project Management Unit (TBT-PMU) in Brussels.
“It basically means that the episode of struggle, challenges and problems faced by the Pacific kava producing countries since the kava ban on the European market in 2002 has now reached a new development state. We’ve been through challenges for the last 13 years with the kava ban in Europe. Europeans must now understand that technical analysis by scientists done in laboratories in Europe, have now confirmed the final findings that consumption of kava has no linkage nor correlation with liver toxicity or heart related diseases as wrongly claimed, Ambassador Joy told Vanuatu Info Online in Barbados.
He added the German Federal Court had rejected twice the appeal to lift the ban on kava and argued that there was no scientific proof to substantiate the safe consumption of kava.
“It subsequently means that the ban that has been uplifted by the Germans must now be organized in such a way that we can start to import or export our high quality kava from the Vanuatu or Pacific into the European market in the next few months.
Ambassador Joy told Vanuatu Info Online that a Pacific High level validation conference on kava will be convened in Port-Vila in the next few weeks.
He said the Vanuatu Embassy in Europe is now working closely with the EU institutions and interlocutors such as CTA and ACP, to be able to find funding in order to convene in Vanuatu in the next few weeks.
It will be the second High Level Kava conference to be held in the Pacific.
During that meeting, Pacific Ministers will discuss the report, validate the kava scientific study so that it can become legally instituted and provide the basis of future long term investment export from the Pacific to the EU market.
“The agenda of this meeting will discuss three main points: The Road of the Pacific Kava exports into the EU market, the Pacific Kava Action Plan and the Future Kava Strategy & Objectives”, said the Vanuatu diplomat.
According to Ambassador Joy the first exports of kava to the European market is expected to resume around December 2015