NAFDAC, Customs finally declare unwholesome, consumption of ‘Best Tomato’ rice

Following weeks of speculation that characterised influx of a suspected fake rice into Nigeria, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), and the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) have finally declared unwholesome for consumption the suspected rice intercepted for seizure recently by officials of the NCS.

At a joint press conference organised by both agencies in Abuja on Thursday, Yetunde Oni, acting director-general of NAFDAC, said the product branded as ‘Best Tomato’ rice was in 25kg pack size, without NAFDAC number, batch number, date markings in addition to not having details of the identity of the manufacturer.

Although the acting director-general informed that the preliminary result of the analysis was conveyed to the minister of health, Isaac Adewole, on December 22, while the comprehensive result was being awaited, explaining that the final comprehensive result had declare as unfit for human consumption, based on the findings discovered on the product.

While giving a breakdown of the plastic rice, she declared the following quality on the rice: “Floating – negative, sedimentation – positive, cooking -normal, odour – normal, colour – off-white grains, moisture – 13 percent (within specification), pre-ashing – 0.6 percent (within specification), lead and calcium – not detected, aerobic mesophillic count -2.8x105cfu (above maximum limits).

Further breakdown shows that mould is -5.1x103cfu (within specification), Coli form – 7.5x103cfu (above maximum limits, E-coli-<3cfu (within specification), packaging does not conform to NAFDAC pre-packaging food labelling regulations 2005.

Oni and the representative of the NCS’ comptroller general, Abubakar Umar, in charge of trade and tariff, said: “Based on the above laboratory result, the product is not plastic rice but rice contaminated with micro-organisms above permissible limit, hence the seized rice consignment is “Unsatisfactory” and therefore unwholesome for human consumption. The consignment upon handover by the NCS shall be destroyed.

In his submission, Abubakar said Customs action was based on credible intelligence the service received from the office of the National Security Adviser alerting the service and other frontline agencies that large consignment of plasticised rice was said to be shipped from far East to Africa.

“As the largest market for imported Rice in Africa, Customs took the alert seriously and charged Officers to watch out for such imports that do not conform to regulatory requirements,” Abubakar said.

Recall, BusinessDay had in November reported that large consignment of trailer loads of rice were at the borders of Benin Republic waiting for influx into the Nigerian market quoting the agricultural minister, Audu Ogbeh, who questions the exploitation of ECOWAS external trade agreements, which he alleged was often being abused by some neighbouring countries taking advantage of huge size of Nigerian market.