EFFORTS to tackle food adulteration is going futile while millions of consumers remained exposed to health hazards but there is hardly anybody to take care the deadly practice sweeping over the market. Market monitors squarely blame government agencies for lack of coordination while government officials are equally blamed for taking bribes from business to allow the criminal practice to continue. A study report of Transparency International, Bangladesh (TIB) made the disclosure saying at least 10 government agencies are dealing with food adulteration and their activities are very much limited to the capital. The report was carried out in several national dailies on Friday which the anti-graft agency released Thursday in a press conference in the city.
It said though the government has appointed sanitary inspectors at upazila level to check production and marketing of adulterated food, there is no funds and guidelines for them. Nobody monitors their job either. The study titled “Ensuring food safety: challenges for good governance and the way out,” produced World Health Organisation (WHO) data, which said around 45 lakh people are affected every year in Bangladesh by consuming adulterated food.
Legal experts present at the press conference severely criticized the government for negligence to protect public health. For example, they said Safe Food Act-2013 which laid emphasis on setting up courts to deal with food related cases was not implemented. It was mandatory in the Pure Food Ordinance-1959 but not in Safe Food Act 2013 showing the nexus between politics and criminal business. Regarding the Consumer Rights Protection Act- 2009, they said it is very hard to find the government officials concerned at the place if anybody wants to file a case, showing yet another area of negligence to public safety. Many countries give life-term imprisonment for food adulteration but Bangladesh goes by with a limited fine. TIB functionaries held the view that it can’t go unabated.
It is indeed unacceptable that the government can’t do more to help the people with adulteration free food which appears to be a new case of food security crisis as it is slowly killing people while they are consuming it. We share TIB’s views that adulteration of food should be punishable by rigorous imprisonment and even with death as many other countries do it. The crime should be seriously treated as it slowly rots and kills people’s internal organs like kidneys and the liver. Food producers should not play with people’s lives and only a stringent law and its effective application can save the nation.
We also hold the view that inspectors should be given high incentives to chase the adulterators while effective monitoring of their performance must be ensured so that they can’t be bribed by dishonest traders. Concomitantly, food producers may also be given incentives by lowering taxes as well as recognition for producing quality food. We commend the service of TIB for raising once again the food safety and security issue and suggest that the government must remove all loopholes from existing law and enact new law to deal the issue severely.
