PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has approved a plan of action against food adulteration and misbranding and expired items across the province.

The plan was formally approved by Chief Minister Mahmood Khan and notified by the chief secretary’s office on Wednesday.

The government also notified provincial and district task forces and divisional oversight committees to implement the plan.

The provincial task force will be headed by the chief secretary and report to the chief minister while divisional oversight committee will be headed by the commissioner and will held monthly meetings to review performance of district task force.

Govt also notifies task forces, oversight bodies to implement plan

The district task forces headed by relevant deputy commissioners will be responsible for implementation of the plan. They will ensure the collection of food samples, initiate action against adulterators and keep liaison with the food business associations to control chemical adulteration.

Initially, the plan focuses on tackling the adulteration of six essential food items, including milk, spices, tea, ghee and cooking oil, water and pulses, and proposes administrative, preventive and legislative measures with specific timelines for its implementation.

The document notes that the provincial government conducted a baseline survey to determine the extent of adulteration of those essential items at the divisional headquarters. The survey showed the 66 per cent of milk samples, 85 per cent of tea, 75 per cent of ghee, 38 per cent of spices and nine per cent of pulses in the provincial capital were adulterated. Swat reported 100 per cent of ghee and oil samples and 71 per cent of milk samples were found to be adulterated.

It added that the detailed explanation was not required for misbranding and expired items and such items could be confiscated without waiting for test results.

However, for the determination of adulteration, sampling survey of food items will be made a continuous process, which will be repeated after every six months.

During the survey, the samples will be collected from both urban and rural tehsils and tests will be conducted on the spot for milk, spices and tea, while detailed lab tests will be conducted for other items.

The plan also includes sampling exercise covering full spectrum supply chain including manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers and retailers with priority given to the wholesaler vis-à-vis retailer.

The district task forces will carry out extensive exercise for identification of sources of manufacture, distribution, wholesale and retail points of the selected items in each district.

Food Safety and Halal Food Authority will lead sample survey exercise, conduct inspections, advocate model food businesses, duly aided by food department, wherever required, while public health and local government departments will be involved in public and private sector tap water tests and remedial measures including source cleaning, replacement of rusted pipes etc.

Also, the plan entails a one-window and smart government access to businessmen, so that they are not inundated by inspections of various offices.

The relevant deputy commissioner will assign joint teams to cover various areas so that a single interface is provided to the sellers and providers.

“It will be ensured that every department does not individually carry out inspections which create botheration instead of public good,” the document said.

The plan also includes resources to be required to purchase testing kits for spot test, funds for lab testing and third party evaluations besides state of the art analysis laboratories at all divisional headquarters through ADP schemes are also part of the Plan.

The document said a special grant of Rs24.83 million would be provided to the Halal Food Authority for the provision of testing kits and tools and to districts for spot tests.

Also, the government will strengthen the Peshawar laboratory and establish such labs at the divisional headquarters during the financial year 2020-21.

A total of Rs165.97 million funds will be provided for mobile laboratories of the Halal Food Authority at the district level in the next budget, while Rs35.869 million will be spent to strengthen water testing laboratories of the public health engineering department.

Published in Dawn, March 13th, 2020