‘Let’s collaborate to ensure food safety’
The Director of Inspection at the Ghana Standards Authority (GSA), Mr Eugene Adarkwa-Addae, has called for greater collaboration between the GSA and Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) towards ensuring that farm produce are of good quality before they are sold for public consumption.
Advertisement
That, he said, would ensure that farm produce were free from contaminants such as residues from pesticides that may have been left on them.
Safety of food
When an inspection of farm produce was made, as well as testing, Mr Adarkwa-Addae said it would ensure that members of the public bought wholesome food items from the markets that would not pose any threat to their health.
He made the call in response to a question posed by the Daily Graphic during the GSA’s interaction with the media in Accra to brief journalists on the GSA’s activities of testing and inspection of products.
The Daily Graphic wanted to know whether the GSA’s mandate of testing and inspection of products covered the testing of farm produce at the farm gate prior to their distribution to the markets.
Mr Adarkwa-Addae said currently that mandate lay with the Plant Protection and Regulatory Services Directorate of the MoFA.
GSA’s mandate
The GSA’s mandate, he said, was limited to testing, inspection and certification of farm produce meant for export.
Mr Adarkwa-Addae explained that the four laboratories in the Testing Division of the GSA had been accredited to ISO/IEC 17025, the internationally accepted standardised requirements, adding that items inspected and tested at the GSA’s laboratories were at par with international standards.
Other Trending Stories
That, he said, was in view of the fact that farmers normally used pesticides to control the destructive activities of pests on the farms and that depending on how late pesticides were used prior to the harvesting of the produce, residues could be left on the produce.
Mr Adarkwa-Addae said if any contaminated food item was allowed into the market to be sold for human consumption, it might have adverse effects on the health and safety of people, as well as the environment.
Writer’s email: victor.kwawukume@ graphic.com.gh