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Safety checks on consumables: Shortcomings in process need to be addressed says Lasantha Alagiyawanna 

17 Apr 2021

  • Existing laws need to be amended to slap stricter penalties 

  The presence of dangerous levels of aflatoxin in imported coconut oil sparked a debate on other food items that are available in the market which can contain carcinogens. With state institutions revealing that there are several food items that contain carcinogens which are currently consumed by the public, the Government is now taking a keen interest in streamlining the process over implementing quality and safety checks for all consumables that are being imported.  The Sunday Morning spoke to State Minister of Co-operative Services, Marketing Development, and Consumer Protection Lasantha Alagiyawanna about the measures the Government plans to take to ensure the entire process is streamlined.  Following are excerpts of the interview:    [caption id="attachment_130526" align="alignright" width="372"] State Minister of Co-operative Services, Marketing Development, and Consumer Protection Lasantha Alagiyawanna[/caption] You recently revealed that out of nearly 7,000 items that are imported, only about 1,500 are tested for carcinogens. What measures are you planning to introduce to ensure imported food items are tested for carcinogens?  Let me clarify that statement. Only about 1,200 items are supervised by Sri Lanka Customs before it is cleared for release. If we take the goods that are presently not being supervised or tested, we are going to list items that should be tested. Then we have to decide as to which institution should be running the tests for each item. This is a new system that we plan to put in place.  There are a number of state institutions that handle quality and safety testing for consumer goods that are similar to the Sri Lanka Standards Institution (SLSI), the Atomic Energy Board, and the Food Safety Unit of the Ministry of Health. We are going to appoint a committee to review and categorise these nearly 7,000 items and assign them to relevant state institutions that have the capacity to run the necessary quality and safety tests. We will also consult the relevant state institutions and ask them to formulate safety and quality guidelines and necessary regulations.  This process will take a considerable amount of time to be implemented, but we have taken the initial steps towards it.    For how long have imported commodities – or a majority of them – been released to the market without proper testing?  Since Sri Lanka obtained its independence, there has not been a proper monitoring mechanism to assess the quality and safety of most of these consumer goods before it gets cleared at Customs for consumption. Even if we take the 1,200 items that are closely scrutinised for quality and safety, we have identified several shortfalls in that process as well.  There are some practical difficulties the institutions are facing at present until a streamlined testing process is implemented. Until the process is implemented, we cannot stop all imports either. If we take, for instance, imported goods such as sports items, furniture, and electrical appliances, for which the Consumer Affairs Authority (CAA) has received several complaints regarding poor quality, we were able to identify many goods that were not subjected to quality and safety checks.    Sri Lanka Customs had stated that they do not have sufficient yard facilities to hold containers of goods until the testing is completed. How do you plan to address this issue?  Sri Lanka Customs has a yard facility on a nine-acre plot of land, but they have plans to acquire 20 acres from Muthurajawela to establish additional yard facilities. Steps have already been taken to improve the yard capacity for Sri Lanka Customs, so that they could hold the containers of which the goods are undergoing testing.    It has been revealed that some testing takes several months and that imported items in such a scenario are released to the importer based on the trust that the goods won’t be released to the market until test results are known. How do you plan to address this issue?  Like I said before, we have already identified that there are several shortcomings in the present process and we plan to address them immediately. For the first time, Sri Lanka has a separate state ministry dedicated to consumer protection, which has been assigned with the responsibility of controlling the entry of goods that are unfit for consumption or use by consumers and to introduce quality standards for products that are locally manufactured.  We have been tasked with a challenge in implementing a process to protect the consumers and ensure the consumables are tested against harmful carcinogens. This has been a national issue, which is why we now have a dedicated ministry established to address the issue.    It was recently revealed that there are many food items that contain carcinogens which are widely consumed by the public. Does your ministry plan to release the list of food items that contain carcinogens?  To provide you clarity on the foods that are released to the market, if there is a quality and safety check procedure that is established for selected food items by the respective state institutions, these food items should not be released for consumption, should the food items fail to meet the quality standards.  At present, we are widely talking about the presence of carcinogens based on global opinions. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has estimated that about 600 million – that is about one in 10 people in the world – fall ill after consuming contaminated food.  If we take the quality standards or the food regulations that are presently practised, those weren’t designed to match the present day’s situation with food quality. Therefore, we need to update these standards and regulations going forward, even if we take the processes followed by each institution to be updated and standardised.  Take, for instance, the threshold of aflatoxins in coconut oil; the parameter followed by the SLSI was 10 microgrammes per kilogramme of oil, but the Food Safety Unit of the Ministry of Health said it was 30 microgrammes per kilogramme of oil.  As the State Ministry, we cannot pick the side of one institution and say their parameters were correct. The experts in this subject need to discuss it and set common and scientifically proven parameters for the food items that they are testing.    Doesn’t the public have the right to know about the food they consume?  The public does have a right to know whether their food is contaminated or not, but when the experts, quality checkers, etc. too are divided in their opinions, it makes it very difficult for us to even list out the foods that are high in carcinogens at the moment. Therefore, we have requested the experts in the field to hold immediate discussions regarding the matter, so that once they have set the necessary parameters for testing, we will be able to inform the public which food items are safe for consumption and which items are not.    The delay in issuing the gazette on banning the sale of blended oils is seen as the Government wanting to allow the importers to get rid of their existing stocks. Is there a truth to his claim?  That claim is untrue. We need to have a proper process in place to practically implement this ban of selling blended oils. The gazette issued in 2016 permitted traders to sell blended oils; however, the CAA has also issued a gazette stating that coconut oil is not permitted to be used for oil blends. Two different gazettes have been issued concerning the same consumer good.  Our Ministry recently wrote to the Attorney General’s (AG) Department about this matter and it returned their final recommendations on Saturday (10).  Following that, the Directors of the CAA decided to cancel both previous gazettes, and before the end of the upcoming week, the gazette on banning the sale of blended oils will be published.  We want to make sure the gazette that will be issued carries clear instructions. Therefore, we would rather delay issuing the gazette than issue a gazette that does not carry clear instructions.    The President has ordered a gazette to be published banning imports of palm oil; however, the Trade Minister has stated that palm oil, which is widely used in the bakery industry, can be imported under special licenses. To ensure that no one misuses these licences, how will the Ministry plan to monitor such imports?  This is a new matter that has come up and we are planning to hold discussions with the relevant stakeholders on the process that will be in place to monitor such operations.    What is the present penalty scheme that is in place for importers that are bringing down substandard products or food items that are unfit for consumption?  I believe the penalty scheme presently in place needs to be immediately amended and changed.    How do you plan to amend the existing laws to ensure stricter penalties are imposed?  This is a matter that needs to be attended to immediately.    How do you plan to ensure consumer safety, given that there are a considerable number of items that are released to the market without undergoing any quality and safety checks?  As the subject ministry, we have understood that there is an issue at hand about consumer safety and we take full responsibility over the matter. I am glad the media institutions have turned their attention to discussing and highlighting this matter.    Do you plan to introduce a system where food items that are imported are subjected to quality and food safety checks prior to the items being shipped to Sri Lanka? How long will it take to implement such a system?  Most of the items undergo safety and quality checks prior to being shipped to the country. Even for the coconut oil that was imported, there were necessary quality check papers that had been submitted. But there is a lack of co-ordination over the process that is in place, which is why we are now looking at immediately streamlining the whole process.   

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