DESPITE a High Court verdict on July 11, 2011 to stop the use of toxic tannery waste in producing poultry and fish feed within a month, a report carried in the daily New Nation on Thursday said, about 200 business firms in the city’s Hazaribagh area are producing poultry feed using such toxic tannery waste. It is needless to say that by doing so they are defying the court’s order. Some profit mongering dishonest businessmen are systematically engaged in producing the feed materials ignoring the ban causing serious risks to human health as people are eating fish and meat fattened by such toxic feed. They are minting huge money from such business while the law enforcers are ignoring the breach of the court orders reportedly benefiting financially from such illegal trade. Experts opine that without proper treatment if animal waste is widely used as a raw material for poultry feed, it could be a serious health hazard to public health. The Bangladesh Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (BCSIR) found lead in poultry feed at harmful levels earlier. About two dozen chemicals are applied to process leather, it said as per the report. Poultry feed usually contains grain, some chemical items are also mixed with poultry feed to increase the production, but using toxic tannery waste ignoring health concerns is essentially a serious crime. Poultry feed produced by animal waste without proper sterilization may contain bacteria, aflatoxins and other elements likely to be a cause of cancer. As poultry is one of the major sources of our nutrition utmost care from the government as well as the regulatory authority concerned is needed to keep its standard higher. At the same time businesses must not be allowed to grow by breaking the rules. We should never neglect our social responsibility and accountability while making profits. The government also cannot deny its responsibility to the citizens. Currently the country has no poultry policy in action or it was not even in place earlier. We must think about our vibrant poultry sector to meet up the challenge of our food safety. So the government should establish a co-ordination cell among the poultry breeders, farmers, feed millers, drug companies, researchers, experts, and feed quality test ensuring authorities to ensure safe food to the birds and fish. Here the existing ‘Feed Act-2010’ can be revised to cope with the proposed Food Safety Act. Besides, we don’t have the sophisticated and high-tech sterilisation mechanisms required for making the feed bacteria-free and safe. The government has planned to establish ‘animal feed analysis laboratories’ in twenty two districts during the years 2010-2014 for the poultry farmers in the rural and semi-rural areas. But it is still not quite clear how far this plan has been executed or how the people are being benefited or ensured about the quality of poultry meat. We ask the public health authorities to give high priority to the safety standards of poultry feed to protect human health from major risks. Hazaribag tannery must be closed and feed processing plants must either follow the rules and court orders or close the door to their operation.
