Even though three months have passed since a test was conducted in a laboratory in Germany into the quality of imported milk powder and identified that certain milk products contain palm oil and certain ingredients that should not be contained in milk powder, the relevant authorities still have not taken measures to raise awareness among the consumers, reports say.
The Consumer Affairs Authority (CAA) had sent the milk powder samples to the Eurofins Global Control - Hamburg laboratory in Hamburg, Germany for testing on 06.03.2019 and the cost was reported to be Rs 707,150.88.
CAA has also submitted another interim report to Parliament based on this report.
The Chairman of the National Movement for Consumer Rights Protection, Ranjith Vithanage has stressed that the representatives of Food Advisory Committee responsible for the importation of milk powder are not independent and people who are more independent should be appointed.
Upon inquiry CAA stated that samples from 5 brands of milk powder have been selected from the open market by a team of investigators and experts from CAA.
The test reports have been sent to the country on 06.06.2019.
CAA has provided milk powder samples to the SGS Lanka Private Limited laboratory to test the quality on 13.06.2018. Three months later, a letter dated 12.09.2018 was submitted to court stating that due to a technical fault that occurred during the test , the test could not be concluded therefore a quality report could not be issued.
Source -Ravaya