The Director General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Mojisola Adeyeye, said non-compliance with advisory guidelines is one of the reasons Nigerian food products are rejected in the United Kingdom (UK).
Mrs Adeyeye gave this disclosure at a press briefing in Abuja on Tuesday where she explained that the unwillingness of exporters to adhere to the minimal sanitary measures also contributes to products being rejected.
According to her, the agency held a scheduled side event with the UK Food Standard Agency (FSA) in order to change the narrative on the incidence of rejection of Nigerian food products in the international market.
She noted that the agency also engaged the FSA on the non-notifications of such rejects and non-engagement of the agency on the matter.
The need, she added, for mutual recognition of electronic certification of both government agencies of export certification, among others.
Her words: “The challenges bedeviling the export process of NAFDAC regulated products especially, assuring safety and quality status of food exports in Nigeria has been traced to non-compliance with advisory guidelines established by NAFDAC to encourage participatory exports.
“Therefore, it is not surprising that all the items exported without NAFDAC quality control and safety tests are rejected.”
The agency noted that as an outcome of its meeting with FSA, it would begin six regulatory-measure approaches to address the situation.
No patriot, she said, should export any NAFDAC-regulated product without it passing through the agency and being certified of its safety and quality status including full compliance with the destination country government requirements.
The agency said the deplorable state of the process for facilitating export trade of regulated products has continued to be a serious cause for concern.
