EU gives Nigeria June 2016 deadline to reduce residue in food exports or face export ban

EUROPEAN Union (EU) leaders have given Nigerian up until June 16 2016 to put a management system in place to reduce pesticide-contaminated food products that it exports to the community or face the continued rejection of her products.

 

At the moment, there is a bar on several Nigerian foods such as dairy products entering the EU because they do not meet health and safety guidelines. With the growing market for Nigerian food across the Europe, exports have boomed lately but the regulatory regime is yet to catch up with the new challenges.

 

Exasperated with Nigeria's inability to address issues such as pesticide levels, aflatoxin limits and the amounts of residue left in foods, the EU has issued a new deadline. Nigeria's National Agency for Food Drug Administration and Control (Nafdac) has expressed concern that these food products rejected in the international market because of their high pesticide residue are actually what Nigerians consume at home.

 

Nafdac director-general, Dr Paul Orhii said this could explain the increased level of cancers, kidney failures and different other diseases in the country. He pointed out these challenges to the new comptroller-general of the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS), Col Hameed Ali yesterday, adding that Nafdac seeks collaboration in safeguarding the health of the nation.

 

Dr Orhii said: “We have taken on the job to make sure that we are going to deploy mobile laboratories that will go from farms and markets to identify at what point these contaminants get into the food products and once we identify it we will conduct public awareness campaign and workshops for the people growing these foods. We also want to put a system in place so that before these products leave our shores to the international markets, the NCS can inquire and test these products to curb the incidence of rejects at the markets.”

 

According to Dr Orhii, the rejection of Nigeria food items on the international market especially Europe, the US and Japan because of concerns on the quality of some of the products is crippling the economy. He said that Nafdac is now using technology to address these concerns and will continue to improve in that regard.

 

“This is most especially when it comes to agricultural products like sesame seeds and beans, which sometimes contain some contaminants like aflatoxins and pesticide residue. When we came in, Nigerian cocoa beans were been rejected on the international market because of pesticide residue but we held workshops with cocoa growers in Akure and since then, our cocoa exports have improved,” Dr Orhii added.