Tareen Rahman :
Instead of wasting time and money on the adulteration of food with formalin, Bangladesh needs to focus on the use of pesticides on food so that it can avoid health hazards, says a World Food Organization (WFO) specialist.
“Bangladeshis should focus on the use pesticides and not formalin as they are more risky than formalin,” Sridhara Dharmopuri said this while speaking at an international scientific conference in the city on Sunday.
Dharmapuri was one of the main scientists in the establishment of the National Food and Safety Laboratory in Bangladesh with the assistance of WFO.
Stefan Lubi, Professor of Medicine of Stamford University and John Rider, Chief Technical Director of safe Food Programmme under WFO were the co-chairs of the conference.
Dharmapuri said that for a couple of years there was a lot of skepticism in the country on the use of formalin. The government faced crisis to control the situation even though they were trying to bring the situation under
control through mobile court. “Formalin is a watery form of ‘formaldehyde’ that is used for textile, plastic, paper and color industries and also for the preservation of dead bodies. But the dishonest businessmen started their trade with formalin to keep fish, vegetables and fruit fresh for a long period of time,” he said.
He said that the instruments used to measure formalin in Bangladesh are not functioning properly. “With this instrument we can only measure formalin in air.”
Even last year, he added, police destroyed thousands of tons of mango in a campaign against formalin. The government’s campaign against formalin became weaker, when there was dispute about some instruments used for campaign against formalin.
“Campaign against formalin should be based on scientific evidence. There is a question of financial demurrage related to this issue, he said.
In the capital, he said, Environmental Sensor Company is using ‘Formaldehyde Vapor Meter of Jade-300’ model to measure formalin in fruits. It is a sensitive instrument to measure formalin in the environment and air.
Dharmapuri opined that it is difficult to measure the quantity of formalin in food stuff as there is no proper demarcation line regarding how much formalin should be allowed in food. Only scientific findings show can show that different types of food have different levels of formalin.
Although formalin is present in fish, but according Dharmapuri, the techniques used for cooking fish in Bangladesh is so much highly processed that very little formalin is left at the end.
Last year, he said that they tested for remnants of formalin in food by three techniques. But the three test methods gave three different types of results.
This indicates that the measurement of this adulteration is very difficult. So, we should not be worried or spend our time and energy on this issue. Instead, we should focus more on the use of pesticides and artificial adulterers in food.
Dharmapuri advised the farmers to get training on the proper use of pesticides in food. He said that dishonest businessmen should be investigated about the techniques that they are employing to admix adulterers in our daily foods which are bad for our health.
