Posted by This Day Online on
The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has closed down El-Amin Bakery & Confectionery Minna, makers of Family Pride Bread and Confectioneries, for using Potassium Bromate as bread improver.
The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has closed down El-Amin Bakery & Confectionery Minna, makers of Family Pride Bread and Confectioneries, for using Potassium Bromate as bread improver.
The bakery is owned by former First Lady, Mrs. Maryam Babangida.
The closure of the bakery, according to a release by Mr. Abubakar Jimoh of the agency's PRO Unit, is part of the on-going crack-down by NAFDAC on bakeries using Potassium Bromate in their bread.
According to the Director of Enforcement NAFDAC, Dioka Ejionueme, El-Amin Bakery & Confectionary was the seventh bakery to be closed down in Minna and other parts of Niger State in two weeks and one of several bakeries closed down by NAFDAC nation-wide in the past few days for using Potassium Bromate as bread improver.
The other bakeries closed down in Niger State were: Vic Winners, Barkin Sale By Morris Junction, Minna; Hamdala, Efu Mayaki, Legbota, Bida; Amana, Angwan Zariawa Suleja; Danjuma International, Plot 3, Salem Road, Kontagora; Sunna, A.B.K. House, BCCC Road, Bida; and Hamdala, Anguwan Kastinawa, Bangi, Mariga.
Potassium Bromate has long been banned by NAFDAC and has been banned also in other countries because of its serious implication in causing cancer and other serious diseases.
Recently, NAFDAC carried out a nation-wide surveillance, on the possible continued use of Potassium Bromate as bread improver in bakeries. At the end of the surveillance many bakeries were found to be still using the banned and injurious bread improver.
As a consequence, the Director-General of NAFDAC Prof. Dora Akunyili gave an immediate directive that any bakery in any part of the country found to be using potassium bromate should be closed down till further notice.It may be recalled that NAFDAC had in the past organized several workshops for stakeholders in the baking industry on the harmful consequencies of using potassium bromate in bread and also on the use of alternative and safe bread improvers. NAFDAC has registered many such safe bread improvers.
The NAFDAC Director once more advised the public to stop buying or eating bread without labels indicating the full location addresses of such bakeries. This is because such unlabelled bread has been found by NAFDAC to be heavily dosed with potassium bromate.
Such bakeries, NAFDAC alleges, "criminally hide their addresses to make it difficult for NAFDAC to apprehend or stop them from their nefarious practices".
He reiterated once more the continued determination of NAFDAC to stop the use of poisonous and deleterious substances in food and to eradicate the distribution of spurious regulated product in Nigeria.