Eleven and a half tonnes of fresh peppers from Macedonia have been stopped at the Bulgarian border. Laboratory analysis found levels of the pesticide formetanate above the permitted limit. The goods never reached the shelves and will be destroyed - either in Bulgaria or at the Drisla landfill, depending on what the operator chooses.

The director of the Food and Veterinary Agency, Oliver Milanov, says the Agency has been informed of the case and is waiting for the operator's decision. „The operator has the right to have the peppers destroyed, or to have them returned so that we, together with the Agriculture Inspectorate, destroy them at his request or at the request of the importing country”, he said.

So the system works. Just one question: whose system?

The inspection Bulgaria carried out

The consignment was not stopped in Macedonia. It was not stopped by a Macedonian phytosanitary inspection, not stopped by a Macedonian laboratory, not stopped before it left. It was stopped after it had crossed the border, by a foreign institution, in a foreign laboratory.

The National Agricultural Network puts the question bluntly: which institutions carried out the phytosanitary and laboratory checks in Macedonia before export? So far there is no answer. The network's president, Ǵorǵi Karakašev, points to a consequence that is not measured in tonnes: when a foreign institution stops a shipment over pesticides, the suspicion spreads well beyond that particular cargo.

Not the first time

This is the part that gets left unsaid. Formetanate in Macedonian peppers was flagged through the European system in 2023 and again in 2025. One shipment is an incident. Three alerts in three years is a pattern.

And if formetanate above the limit turns up in peppers destined for export, it raises the question none of the authorities will ask out loud: what happens to the same harvest that never goes for export? A shopper does not carry a laboratory to the market. They rely on an inspection they cannot even be sure took place.

The ones who played by the rules pay the price

Farmers who respect withdrawal periods and spray properly are now entering a period of stricter inspections, higher costs and lost foreign buyers. Not because of anything they did, but because of somebody else's consignment.

The Food and Veterinary Agency and the State Agriculture Inspectorate are being asked for a transparent explanation - which producer is involved, whether related batches were tested, and whether part of that produce ended up on the domestic market. Three specific questions with three specific answers.

So far we have exactly one data point: eleven and a half tonnes, discovered by another country.