Amid outrage by Nigerians on the rise of fake products in Nigeria’s markets, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, NAFDAC, has blamed inadequate workforce and porous borders for the menace.
The Director General of NAFDAC, Prof Mojisola Adeyeye, disclosed this in a Channels Television interview monitored by DAILY POST on Wednesday.
According to her, Nigeria’s rise in fake products reflects the country’s problem.
She noted that while the agency plans to up its antics in checking the spread of fake products, Nigerians must be more cautious by purchasing food and other products only at identifiable places.
Adeyeye added that the current 10th National Assembly and the Minister of Health are working to address the agency’s staff shortage and improve laws to punish fake product offenders in Nigeria.
“We go to the market routinely to ensure the registered products are on the shelves. However, we depend on intelligence. The raid we conducted in Aba recently, the investigation has been on for a while, but when you have a large portion of the market dealing with faking of products, you can just walk in and make seizures.
“Therefore, we need to be careful not to endanger our staff’s lives, so I advise the public to shop at designated places. It is likely fake if it is too good to be true with price. Unfortunately, we have a very porous border, so when people are sold cheap things, they don’t question it.
“NAFDAC works very well. However, we need more staff. We have only 2,000 staff for over 200,000 Nigerians, which is also part of the problem”, she said.
Regarding the availability of adequate equipment for the agency, Adeyeye said, “We got 40 pieces of ‘true scans’ for detecting fake medicines. We have used it to identify sub-standard drugs. However, the quantity aspect of it needs a lot of chemometrics; our staff are currently undergoing such training.
“We had 72 scanners in mind, two or 0ne per state, and then distributed around the ports and borders, but we could buy only 40 due to the Naira devaluation.”
Her reaction comes amid outrage by Nigerians on social media over the untamed spread of fake products such as drinks, foods, medicines, cosmetics and other products across the country.
NAFDAC under scrutiny over rise of fake products in Nigerian markets
