ISLAMABAD: The Senate Standing Committee on Science and Technology on Monday directed the ministry and the Pakistan Standards and Quality Control Authority (PSQCA) to protect the business interest of tea whitener sellers.

The corporate sector has been of the view that if a message, “It is not an alternative to milk” was printed on the packets of tea whiteners, not only the sale of the product would be affected but other countries such as India would also follow suit.

The observations came during a briefing to the meeting by the ministry of science on standards developed for tea whiteners, powder milk and packaged milk.

At the start of the meeting, Chairman Osman Saifullah Khan said tea whiteners were used by millions of citizens so the committee wanted to protect their interest.

Corporate sector says if ‘it is not an alternative to milk’ message is printed on packets of tea whiteners, its sale will be affected

PSQCA Director General Mohammad Khalid Sidique informed the meeting that there was a suggestion to mention on the packets of tea whiteners that it cannot be an alternative to milk.

“Vegetable oil is added to tea whiteners and it has almost double amount of vegetable fats compared to milk. Moreover, tea whiteners are not included in the mandatory lists so the authority does not have a mandate to check them. We have apprehensions that tea whiteners can be used for drinking,” he said.

Senator Mian Ateeq Sheikh of the MQM intervened and came down hard on Mr Sidique.

He said he was well aware of his (Mr Sidique’s) activities and even knew with whom he had a lunch during his visit to Hattar.

Because of the comments, Mr Sidique stopped supporting the addition of a message to the packets of tea whiteners.

Food safety consultant Zuzzer Ali Shamsuddin said tea whiteners can have full dairy ingredients, purely vegetable ingredients or a mixture of both.

“Tea whiteners have nothing injurious to health and are sold across the world. However, excessive use of anything can be dangerous,” he said.

Another food expert, Ibrar Hussain, said though the share of whiteners in tea making was 52pc across the country, their share in the revenue was 40pc which meant the tea whiteners were cheaper.

“Moreover, every person uses 18kg vegetable oil per year in Pakistan, which is equal to three to four million tons, and considered safe, but whenever the same oil is included in the tea whiteners in a small quantity rumours start circulating that it is not safe,” he said.

“The fact is in Pakistan unregulated dairy products worth $8 billion are sold every year and regulated dairy products get the share of around $2 billion. The regulated industry has standards but unregulated industry does not follow any standard,” he said.

“Moreover, people want to have creamy tea and if only 60pc of the population have three cups of tea every day they would spend Rs5.5 billion. Tea whiteners are not only cheaper but they also give energy to the consumers most of whom just depend on bread and tea,” he said.

Senator Abdul Qayyum said it was a fact that people were not satisfied with the quality of tea whiteners and it was the job of the offices concerned to ensure that tea whiteners, chicken, meat and other products were safe.

A representative of companies, Dr Mohammad Nasir, claimed that tea whiteners were safe as its milk fats had been replaced with vegetable fats increasing its viscosity.

He also claimed that whiteners had been used across the globe since 1940s and were introduced in Pakistan in 2007. Moreover, whiteners reduce chances of cardiovascular diseases. However, he said a message “It is not milk” is mentioned on the packets not only the consumers would reduce its use but even in India people will start demanding that a similar message should be mentioned on the packets.

Rehan Saeed Khan from a company said only ingredients were written on the products and if once the practice of writing what was not present in the product started the list would never end.

Senator Ateeq said only ingredients can be written on the products and it cannot be mentioned that what is not present in the product.

Senator Sajid Mir said the committee should recommend that any steps against the industry should not be taken.

The PSQCA chief told Dawn that as there was a lack of public awareness he believed that it should be mentioned on tea whitener packets that it is not an alternative to milk.

“Now after getting recommendations from the parliamentary committee, we will consider the issue again and see what should be done,” he said.

Published in Dawn, October 17th, 2017