Official and national reference laboratories

In accordance with Articles 43 and 44. the Act on official controls and other official activities performed in accordance with food, feed, animal health and welfare, plant health and plant protection products (NN No 52/21) and the Ordinance on authorising official and national reference laboratories to carry out laboratory analyses, tests and diagnoses on samples taken during official controls and other official activities (NN No 33/24) (hereinafter: Ordinance), the Ministry responsible for agriculture shall designate or authorise official and national reference laboratories to carry out laboratory analyses, tests and diagnoses on samples taken during official controls and other official activities.

The areas of designation of laboratories, in accordance with the Ordinance, include food and feed, organic production, animal health, plant health and plant protection products (physicochemical properties).

The areas for which national reference laboratories should be designated are set out in Annex 3. Of the Ordinance.

The application, together with the supporting documents referred to in the Ordinance, must be submitted in writing to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Planinska 2a, 10000 Zagreb, and must be submitted electronically to the following e-mail address: laboratoriji@mps.hr:

      • Request for designation of an official laboratory – Annex 1 of the Ordinance

      • Request for designation of a national reference laboratory – Annex 2 of the Ordinance

      • Request to withdraw the authorisation of an official/national reference laboratory – Annex 4 of the Ordinance.

According to Articles 15 and 18. By 28 February of each year, official and national reference laboratories shall submit to the Ministry an annual report for the previous year on the analyses, tests or diagnoses carried out by them in the context of official controls and other official activities in electronic form of the excel document referred to in Annex 5 of the Ordinance, at the following e-mail address: laboratoriji@mps.hr.

In accordance with Article 16. of Ordinance, for the purposes of reporting to the European Food Safety Authority, official and national reference laboratories must submit to the Croatian Agency for Agriculture and Food national data on the results of laboratory analyses of samples of official controls on food, feed and animals for the previous year, according to the following format – Simplified_SSD_2023.

In accordance with Article 18. National reference laboratories are required to:

      • for the duration of the designation, no later than 30 October of the current year, submit to the Ministry the plan of activities for the following year referred to in Annex 6 of Ordinance

      • submit to the Ministry, by 15 February of the current year, a report on the activities carried out in the previous year referred to in Annex 6 of the Ordinance

      • the report referred to in paragraph 2 of Article 18. By 15 February of the current year, notify the Ministry of the annual report of the official laboratories referred to in Article 15 of the Ordinance.