MILK ADULTERATION

Pashu Sandesh, 27th December 2019

RUHI MEENA

Postgraduate institute of veterinary education and research,

Jaipur Rajasthan

Milk is an essential thing or food for a human being for neonatal as they can’t digest other food and milk is easy to digest. It is a lacteal secretion which is produced by mammary glands of mammals. Milk is a very good source of essential nutrients for human growth like high-quality protein (whey and casein), sugar (lactose), calcium, fat (saturated and unsaturated), hormone, vitamins, carbohydrates, minerals and many more. Due to these nutritive qualities i.e. is very good for human. The quality of milk also determines by stage of lactation, feed material, breed of animal etc. 

But according to a survey it comes in our knowledge about 70-75% milk is adulterated which is sold in the market for human consumption. In our country milk vendor are doing so unethical things like adulteration materials are using are mentioned here-Impure water, starch, whey powder, flour, skimmed milk powder, vegetable oil, urea (for fat), hydrogen peroxide( disturb immunity  of body), carbonates, bicarbonates, antibiotics, caustic soda, ammonia for making long-lasting and making it good in appearance.

Adulteration is completely banned in India still these activities are going which is very harmful to a human being, it cause many diseases like cancer and another malfunctioning, it is very harmful to the fetus and pregnant women.

India is the largest producer of milk followed by the U.S., China, Pakistan, Brazil, Germany, Russia, France, New Zealand and turkey. Still, our supply is not up to demand as there is a gap between supply and demand and to fulfil these gap vendors are doing adulteration.

As milk is a perishable commodity and we are lacking proper collection centres, transportation, distribution, processing facilities and value addition techniques millions of milk is wasted on a daily basis. Our govt. also doing efforts to overcome the problem but due to some loophole.

The govt. of India announced the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act (PFA Act) in 1954 and came into force from June 1955 for reducing the adulteration issue overcome. This act prohibits manufacture sale and distribution of adulterated food with toxicants.

After many efforts of food legislation adulteration are uncontrolled due to lack and untrained manpower and laboratory facilities.  The government should take an appropriate action to control adulteration along with awareness also need to spread in the population.

Here some details about adulteration factor to know to check these impurities, so people can self-identify the impurity in their products. Govt. need to spread likewise some programme to an aware population of India and also to control these unethical activities.

Milk Adulteration factor and harmful effect-. 

Govt. are doing survey time to time to find out the level of adulteration.  According to the national survey of milk adulteration by FSSAI in 2011 water is very common adulteration factor followed by the detergent in milk. According to 2012 survey, some sample took and found that approx 68% sample was adulterated sample which was took out of that 31% was from rural areas and 16.7 % were branded packet milk and rest were loose milk sample from dairy. In the urban area also 68.9% milk was adulterated with water, detergent, urea and skim milk powder.  

Who (World Health Organisation) also warns India in 2018 that if milk and milk products adulteration not in control than 85% of the population will suffer from a severe disease like cancer. In 2018 the national milk safety and the quality survey were done in that 6432 milk samples collected throughout different town and cities of India. These samples having raw as well as processed milk and collected from organised and unorganised sector. In this analysis, FSSAI found out of 6432 sample only 12 found to be unsafe for human consumption. They found that adulteration which was actually in the market was not true according to the survey. But 2 major concerns reveals in survey one is the presence of aflatoxin residues and second is 41% sample was found low on the quality scale which might be safe but not ideal. After that, a survey also was done in Oct 2019 by FSSAI only 62% of milk which is sold in the country does meet the govt’s quality standard. But about 38% does not meet quality standards and having harmful contaminants like antibiotics, pesticides and aflatoxin. This report also reveals that the highest incidents of adulteration found in Telangana followed by Madhya Pradesh and Kerala. 

As per report adulteration per cent is too low but as we are reading in news about adulteration sometimes in Jaipur nov., 2019 2000kg of paneer made with acid has been seized by police and in Oct 2019 200 kg adulterated  milk cake also destroyed by police, Bhopal in August 2019  20000 litres of milk also found adultered with detergent  by Madhya Pradesh food  and drug administration department and Madhya Pradesh Special task force also arrested  57 people from behind morena districts with 20 tankers, 11 pickup vans etc. this somehow needs to analysis very seriously. There is a need from govt. to take strict compliance to check the adulteration and also make awareness to the population of India so they can also identify at their own level.

After this survey, FSSAI also commits to zero tolerance for adulteration and contamination and will make best efforts for surveillance and enforcement in hotspot identified through the survey.