The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) yesterday warned Nigerians to shun frozen poultry products and other food items preserved with formalin.
Formalin is a poisonous chemical popularly used to preserve the human body in mortuaries.
NAFDAC’s spokesman, Dr. Abubakar Jimoh, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja that some people it called unscrupulous business owners had been using formalin to preserve poultry products, chicken and turkey, in particular.
Formalin is capable of preserving such products for weeks before they get to consumers, he warned.
“NAFDAC is alerting Nigerians to this practice. There are enough poultry products in the country than to resort to frozen chicken smuggled in, despite Federal Government’s ban,” Jimoh said.
The NAFDAC spokesman also called the attention of consumers to the economic import of patronising business owners who smuggle poultry products into the country.
He noted that if such patronage continued, indigenous poultry farmers and marketers would not grow as desired, as the money spent on smuggled products would only go to producers of the products.
Jimoh added that the patronage of imported or smuggled products would also continue to negatively affect Nigeria’s foreign exchange reserves.