FG moves against food fraud, targets practices linked to 53,000 deaths.
The government also warned that individuals and businesses involved in the production and sale of contaminated or adulterated food risk between […] The post FG moves against food fraud, targets practices linked to 53,000 deaths appeared first on Vanguard News .
By Chioma Obinna The Federal Government has unveiled a multi-pronged strategy to tackle food contamination, adulteration and unsafe processing practices blamed for an estimated 50 million food-borne illnesses and 53,000 related deaths in Nigeria.
The Minister of Innovation, Science and Technology, Dr Kingsley Tochukwu Udeh, disclosed this in Abuja on Tuesday, saying the government would strengthen enforcement of food safety laws and collaborate with the Ministry of Justice and the Attorney-General to prosecute offenders.
Udeh said the measures were aimed at protecting Nigerians from the growing dangers associated with unsafe food and ensuring that those responsible for food-related violations were held accountable. He described the scale of food-borne diseases as alarming, citing a World Health Organisation (WHO) report released in June, which estimated that 866 million people worldwide suffered food-borne illnesses in 2021, resulting in 1.52 million deaths, including 143,000 children under five. The report also put the global economic burden of food-borne diseases at $310 billion. According to the minister, WHO studies have established that unsafe food can cause more than 200 diseases, ranging from diarrhoea to cancer.
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