Polish Jewish museum to host country’s first kosher market in decades

JTA — Poland’s main Jewish museum is set to host an event whose organizers say will be the country’s first large-scale kosher market in decades.

Kosher Expo Poland will open on November 6, as part of the 5th Food Safety Congress, which this year will be hosted at the Polin museum in central Warsaw.

Seven companies will showcase their kosher products at Kosher Expo Poland, including the OSM Grawolin dairy maker; Pravda Vodka; the Union chocolate maker; the Kopernik confectionery factory; health food producer Kupiec, and the Royal Apple juice maker, according to Klaudia Klimek, director of the Jewrnalism Foundation that is organizing the kosher market.

Klimek’s foundation works with the Polish Investment and Trade Agency and organizations issuing kosher certifications to streamline the process, in order to increase exports from Poland to markets requiring kosher labels.

The event is for “Polish companies that want to export their kosher products to Israel and the United States,” she said. El Al, Israel’s national airlines, is sponsoring the event, along with the Poland-Israel chamber of commerce.

Poland, a country the size of New Mexico, has traditionally been Europe’s breadbasket, the Financial Observer noted in a 2015 article. It is known for its cattle industry, which is considered the best in Central and Eastern Europe.

With the 2014 lifting of a brief ban on the export of kosher and halal meat, Poland again became a European leader in that industry. However, kosher meat will not be on offer at Kosher Expo Poland, Klimek told JTA Friday.