Pran, again!

The European Union has detained an export shipment of local food processor Pran after rodent excrement, a hazardous element, was found in the consignment.
The border control of Italy on May 21 refused entry to the shipment containing Pran-branded noodles, rice, olive pickle, vinegar, potato crackers, sweet toast, mango chutney, puffed rice, among others, on grounds that it had become contaminated by rat droppings.
The authorities immediately sent out a warning via the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed, a notification system operated by the European Commission to exchange information on identified hazards in food and feed between the member states.
The EU's Dhaka office also informed the government, the leading trade bodies and Pran on May 25 about the matter and called for measures to avoid repeat of the incident.
Asked, Kamruzzaman Kamal, Pran's director of marketing, said the food processor is yet to receive any such letter from the EU.
“But we have come to know from our importer in Italy that a consignment has been held up at the port after officials saw rat inside the container and sealed it. So, it was the problem of container and not our products,” he told The Daily Star over telephone.
“The rat may have entered the container during loading at the port, where we do not have control. But, it has not entered from our factory.”
He said the company is trying to get detailed information on the matter, adding that only the contaminated batches would be recalled from the domestic market.
“But it does not mean that we will recall all the products that are being sent abroad.”
The incident comes just seven months after the US Food and Drug Administration detected high levels of lead in Pran's packaged turmeric and asked stores to recall the product.
Later, the Bangladesh Council of Scientific and Industrial Research and Bangladesh Standards and Testing Institution (BSTI) too found lead much higher than the permissible limit of 2.5 parts per million (PPM) in Pran's turmeric.
Subsequently, BSTI temporarily suspended Pran's turmeric processing licence, only to withdraw it after the food processor assured of destruction of the lead-contaminated turmeric batch and fulfilled BSTI's conditions, according to Kamal Prashad Das, BSTI's director for certification mark.
About the latest incident, he said: “Rat excrement is neither an ingredient nor a raw material for any product. We will immediately take action. We will ask Pran about the reasons for contamination and investigate the matter.”
When asked if recurrence of detection of health hazardous elements by authorities abroad undermined the BSTI certification, Das said the authority does not give certification to Pran only.
“We issue standardisation certificates to other companies. Unfortunately, the contamination is found in case of Pran products only. So we will look into the matter seriously.”
When asked about the reason behind repeated incidence of contamination of Pran's products, Kamal said: “Ultimately, the responsibility is ours -- we will improve ourselves. We will be more careful in future. We will increase checking at every point.”