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Doris Obinna
The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, (NAFDAC) has said that the rationale behind the GS1 standards for traceability in the food and consumer product goods is to ensure quality safety and effectiveness.
This, the Director General, NAFDAC, Prof Mojisola Adeyeye explained during a sensitisation campaign on traceability of food and other consumer products in Lagos
According to her, it is important to ensure that the food we eat the water we drink, the vegetables and whatever type of food we consume are of quality, and to be of quality we must check where they come from and where they are going.
“The process they go through in the supply chain is robust. And this sensitisation is all about verification of the sources of the food and also tracking where the food is going because the public are the final consumers, so that is why they have to go through NAFDAC.
“Part of what we are doing is to ensure that our customers are first in terms of the quality of the food and other products whether it’s water, it doesn’t really matter, for us as an agency, it is all about verification, tracking and tracing the consumer’s products that we regulate.
Adeyeye who noted that the about 70 per cent Nigeria foods are rejected abroad said because most of the products don’t go through NAFDAC, the rejection was a huge loss of money and investment.
She disclosed that some wants to take short cuts, but when they get at the other end, there is no short cut the products are destroyed. “So it is the duty of NAFDAC to enlighten the public as most people don’t know about the role of NAFDAC in export.
“As an agency, we carry out all kinds of testing to determine whether there is pesticide, residual, mole in the food. We have to do all sorts of testing because if we don’t when it gets to the other side, it gets destroyed, so it’s essentially because people are not informed. Without verification, track and trace of whatever products that are going abroad we will not be able to play on the global field.”
Adeyeye who reiterated that track and trace is importanted, said, “when things happen and you want to do a recall, you need a robust chain management to get the recall of the products.”
She continued: “Onward, NAFDAC will ensure that the product it approves will be a product of quality and if there is going to be any infiltration, it will be able to trace and trace it. Our NAFDAC number is going to immune into the bar-coding so that people will know when they are scanning that they are going to scan NAFDAC number.
“So far, what we are doing now is to eliminate a situation where people now fake our numbers. So by the year 2025, we should be able to have about 70 per cent of our traders using bar-coding for traceability.
Adding further, the DG said the agency has a robust team of agencies involved in exports like, the Shippers council, SON, Customs etc on ground. “To ensure quality of foods and others, we need to check to make sure that where they came from is of quality and where they are going of the way they go through the supply chain.”
