Mycotoxin and Pesticides Residues lab.
Recently, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) recorded another major breakthrough in her regulatory activity with the international accreditation of her two major laboratories. Precisely, NAFDAC’s Mycotoxin and Pesticides Residues Laboratories located at Oshodi in Lagos just obtained the ISO 17025 accreditation conducted by the American Association of Laboratory Accreditation.
According to the Director-General of NAFDAC, Dr. Paul Orhii, the accreditation project, which was sponsored by United Nations Industrial Development (UNIDO), has launched the two laboratories into the league of internationally recognised and respected laboratories. With the ISO 17025 accreditation of the two laboratories, value-added agricultural exports tested and certified by the agency will now be accepted worldwide without query.
Though often relegated to the background, the significant role that quality laboratories play in ensuring that consumable products that pass through them are safe, free from contaminants, all forms of hazardous impurities and toxins cannot be underestimated. It is, therefore, a great stride taken by the food and drugs agency to protect Nigerian consumers from such products.
In addition, the fact that agric exports from the country could now compete favourably with similar ones from all over the world has put us in good stead. Indeed, only recently I suggested in this same column that the Federal Ministry of Agriculture should work closely with the reputable and world-recognised agency towards putting the country in a reputable position globally to ensure food safety. One cannot but congratulate the eggheads at NAFDAC for the recent feat.
As Dr. Orhii rightly noted, this is a major boost to the country’s image and agricultural transformation agenda (ATA) of the Federal Government. He explained that all products analysed for export purpose by the two laboratories would now carry a special logo, making the commodities acceptable all over the world.
The NAGDAC DG said some other laboratories of the agency are also undergoing international accreditation, which would greatly boost current efforts to get some pharmaceutical companies to obtain World Health Organisation (WHO) pre-qualification.
During the tenure of the current DG, the agency has deployed cutting-edge technology to fight the counterfeiting of drugs as well as processed foods with great success that has attracted international acclaim. These include the use of truscan, the Moblie Authentication System (MAS)/Short Messaging Services (SMS) and the Radio Frequency Identification (RFID).Others include the Near Infra-red Spectrometer (NIR) and Red Eye to protect consumers from products that are fake, unwholesome, adulterated and hazardous to human health.
NAFDAC was established by Decree 15 of 1993 as amended by Decree 19 of 1999 and now the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control Act Cap N1 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004.
This Act mandates NAFDAC to regulate and control the manufacture, importation, exportation, distribution, advertisement, sale and use of food, drugs, cosmetics, chemicals, detergents, medical devices and packaged water (known as ‘regulated products’).
The scope of this mandate puts the responsibility of ensuring compliance with regulations and other international laws governing the use of radio-pharmaceuticals on NAFDAC. The essence of control and regulation is to protect public health by ensuring that only quality regulated products that are safe, efficacious and wholesome reach the market, and ultimately the consuming public.
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