PESHAWAR, Aug 7: The delay in the enactment of a law for regulating the marketing of artificial infant foods and feeding products has given a freehand to the infant food industry for carrying out unethical promotion of its products.

While the government observed the International Week of breastfeeding from Aug 1 to 7, it has been delaying the enactment of the proposed Protection of Breastfeeding and Child Nutrition Ordinance. Apparently, the reason behind this inordinate delay is the pressure of multinational companies involved in the production of infant foods and feeding products.

Experts claimed that for the last one decade successive governments had been working on the proposed law and even the present government had made commitment on several occasions ever since it assumed power on Oct 12, 1999, that it would enact the law at the earliest, there is no sign of it as yet.

Contrary to prevailing practice in rest of the world and neighbouring countries, here the infant formulas and other infant food products are encouraged and are easily available at all the general stores, grocery shops and even in bakeries.

The situation becomes more complicated in the wake of vigorous marketing campaign of these products launched by respective multinationals, which discourage breastfeeding and try to promote the use of baby food products. These companies have specially targeted maternity homes and nurseries so as to introduce their products to mothers from the very first day of childbirth.

An owner of a leading general store here said: “As incentives, special discounts are offered to leading distributors and general stores by the baby food companies, in return, they display their products in an impressive manner.” He added that they had also been provided products on credit so that they could enhance their sale.

A paediatrician in one of the three major hospitals of the provincial capital claimed that most of the infant deaths in Pakistan occurred due to diarrhoea and respiratory infections, which were most likely to occur in babies who were not breastfed or only partially breastfed. He regretted that the paediatricians had not been playing their due role in encouraging breastfeeding and discouraging infant formulas, as in most of the cases they had been receiving gifts and other incentives from the multinationals.

Pakistan was one of the 118 counties, which, in May 1981, adopted the International Code of Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes. Similarly, in August 1996, Pakistan hosted a Saarc ministerial conference at which all the seven member countries adopted the Saarc Code for the Protection of Breastfeeding and Young Child Nutrition. Saarc countries Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal and India have already enacted laws to check unethical practices of multinationals and to regulate marketing of artificial infant food.

The proposed law has various salient features, including: no advertisement of any designated product; labels must not contain anything that may discourage breastfeeding and must be approved before marketing or sale in Pakistan; all labels must be written in Urdu and contain stipulated notices and information; free or low cost supplies, gifts, services or other benefits should not be given to health workers or health-care facilities; condensed milk, evaporated milk and skimmed milk must contain a notice stating that it should not be fed to babies below one year of age; and, it shall not be stated or implied that designated products are a substitute for mother’s milk nor that they are equivalent to, comparable with or superior to mother’s milk.