The Ogun State government has said it would conduct compliance exercises on all table and sachet water factories in the state following the outbreak of Cholera in some parts of the state.
The government threatened that any company which fails the test “will be shut and remain so until it passes the laid down procedures.”
Newspot recalls that no fewer than 12 persons died of Cholera in October when about 250 cases were recorded in Ijebu North, Abeokuta South and Abeokuta North Local Government Areas of Ogun.
At a stakeholder’s meeting with members of the Table Water And Beverages Producers Association of Nigeria, Ogun State Chapter, the Commissioner for Environment, Ola Oresanya, maintained that the compliance exercise is imperative to address the environmental and hygienic negligence detected in water production processes.
During the meeting, which also had officials of the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Industries, Trade and Investment in attendance, Oresanya, said the environmental and hygienic negligence detected in the companies is at variance with their earlier certification by the National Agency For Food And Drug Administration And Control (NAFDAC).
This, he said, “resulted in the outbreak of Cholera which claimed some lives while others were hospitalized.”
According to Oresanya, the state government with the compliance exercise, will now “domesticate the NAFDAC certification” throughout the state, saying the team will move to all water-producing factories for on-the-spot assessment of water production processes.
The commissioner said: “The team will among others demand routine microbial analysis results of their products, check the distance of their production boreholes to their septic tanks, their operational environment as well as a medical certificate of fitness of their products for human consumption.”
He added that all registered and unregistered water factories will be visited, even as he called for total support from the stakeholders.
He stated that the government is not out to witch hunt any of them but to safeguard the health of its residents from preventable waterborne diseases.
Meanwhile, the Chairman of the association in Ogun State Chapter, Femi Olukoga, pledged his members’ support for the exercise.
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