This Code applies to spices and dried aromatic herbs - whole, broken, ground or blended. Spices and dried aromatic herbs may include the dried aril (e.g. the mace of nutmeg), bark (e.g. cinnamon), berries (e.g. black pepper), buds (e.g. clove), bulbs (e.g. dried garlic), leaves (e.g. dried basil), rhizomes (e.g. ginger, turmeric), seeds (e.g. mustard), stigmas (e.g. saffron), pods (e.g. vanilla), resins (e.g. asafoetida), fruits (e.g. dried chilli) or plant tops (e.g. dried chives). It covers the minimum requirements of hygiene for growing, harvesting and post-harvest practices (e.g. curing, bleaching, blanching, cutting, drying, cleaning, grading, packing, transportation and storage, including disinfestation and fumigation) processing establishment, processing technology and practices (e.g. grinding, blending, freezing and freeze-drying, treatments to reduce the microbial load) packaging and storage of processed products. For spices and aromatic herbs collected from the wild, only the measures for handling and post-harvest activities (i.e. from section 3.2.3 onward) apply.