‘Punjab to ban sale of unpackaged milk from 2020’

ISLAMABAD: Punjab Food Authority (PFA) Chairman Umar Tanveer on Wednesday said the province would ban sale of open milk with effect from 2022.

Speaking at a seminar organised by Pakistan Dairy Association (PDA), the PFA chairman said creating awareness about processed milk among small farmers and consumers was a difficult task, but PFA was fully determined to ensure provision of safe milk supply to all consumers.

The authority, he said was checking the quality of milk at 40,000 outlets and they had discarded 600,000 litres of spurious milk alone in 2018.

The key note speaker, Prof Dr Nevzat Artik, affiliated with Food Safety Institute University of Ankara, said Pakistan has more cattle, goat, and sheep compared to Turkey, but milk production was not up to the mark.

Currently, the exports of dairy products from Turkey were around $325 million, whereas the country imported butter and cheese worth $92 million.

He suggested that the government should establish cooperative cooling system in rural areas for small farmers, who should operate and manage those systems. The seminar aimed to bring together all the stakeholders to share their expertise and reach a consensus to uplift the dairy industry. It was also to talk about legislations to control the provision of unsafe milk in consumer markets.

The event was opened by Nestle Pakistan Chairman Syed Yawar Ali, with Federal Minister for Food Security and Research Mehboob Sultan in chair.

Pakistan Dairy Association Chairman Sulaiman Monnoo said, “Currently Pakistan is amongst the 5 largest dairy producing countries in the world, yet unfortunately 95 percent of the milk traded in Pakistan is sold as loose milk, most of which is unhygienic or adulterated and is not providing our masses with the required nutrition they need resulting in problems such as malnutrition and stunted growth as highlighted by the Prime Minister in his inaugural address.” He lauded the Punjab government step of introducing a minimum pasteurisation law to ensure that all the milk being produced was free of adulterants and harmful bacteria, and complied with certain minimum nutritional standards that made it fit for consumption.