ISLAMABAD: The Senate Standing Committee on Commerce has recommended separation of quality of whey power from milk powder. In this regard, Ministry of Commerce, Science and Technology and Ministry of Finance to coordinate with each other to revisit the import policy order to ensure the standards of import of powdered milk.
The issue had been raised in the Senate by Senator Attiq in the form of a question saying that imported whey powder was causing cancer among the users and its import should be banned. The Senate referred this question along with stances of concerned stakeholders to the Commerce Committee on September 29 last year.
Senate Commerce Committee, in a report on a matter emerged out of a question asked by Senator Mian Attiq Sheikh about import of huge quantity of powdered milk, observed that there were several varieties of powdered milk were being used by different segments of society. One of these categories was tea whitener. Certain products being imported under umbrella of powdered milk were carcinogenic and can potentially cause cancer.
The report further said that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) was the standards implementing agency for conducting random checks on the sample of shipment, in addition to checks on shipments against which complaints are received. A certificate is then issued against which the shipment is released.
However, as per report, Ministry of Commerce is of the stance, that during the formation and development of import policy order by the MoC, all stakeholders were properly consulted, no objection or any study suggesting that whey power contains carcinogenic properties was raised by the ministry. The MoC sought recommendations from the committee on this issue to impose a ban on the import of whey powder.
The misuse of the item arises out of its post import usage in the making of non prescribed product through unapproved methods. Therefore, there may be an implementation gap to check the quality before usages of powdered milk in making various food products.
