Nutritionist calls for law on proper labelling of beverages
The Deputy Chief Nutrition Officer of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Ms Esi Amoaful, has advocated the promulgation of a Legislative Instrument (LI) to enforce the proper labelling of beverages in the country.
Advertisement
She said due to the absence of the LI, producers label beverages as fruit juice or energy drink when in actual sense those beverages did not meet the standards.
Ms Amoaful made the call at a workshop on food, markets and nutrition organised by the Institute of Development Studies of the Ghana of Ghana, Legon.
The workshop brought together nutrition experts from government, private sector, civil society organisations and the academia to discuss how to improve the nutrition situation in the country.
Ms Amoaful said the LI would empower state agencies, such as the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) to stop the importation of certain kinds of beverages and products that did not meet the required standards.
“We need legislation to say that these kinds of products cannot be imported into the country,” she said.
Nutrition policy
The Technical Committee Vice Chairman of the Ghana Coalition of Civil Society Organisation for Scaling up Nutrition, Mr Fidelis Avogo, asked the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) to facilitate work on the Nutrition Policy.
He said work on the policy was completed in 2013, and indicated that the delay in sending the policy to the Cabinet for consideration and approval was unwarranted.
Mt Avogo pointed out that was that it was only after the approval by the Cabinet that the policy could be sent to Parliament for consideration and approval.
He indicated that the issue of nutrition had moved a step further from a health issue to a development issue, because of its impact on the wellbeing of people.
Therefore, he said, it was crucial for the government to take the necessary steps to project issues bordering on nutrition in the country.