Milk gone bad

The Pakistan Standards and Quality Control Authority has recently declared all milk samples collected from Karachi for testing as unfit for human consumption, setting off alarm bells in most households. According to a report submitted to Sindh High Court, hygiene practices and safety standards are not being followed at various points of the supply chain, including with farmers and retailers, making milk hazardous to human health. This less than sub-par quality of a staple food, that too often adulterated, is conveniently ignored when raising milk prices in the market.

As disheartening as it is to acknowledge that even organic, whole food items cannot be trusted in this city, it is not a new problem. Eight years ago, tests conducted by the Pakistan Council of Scientific and Industrial Research found that out of sixteen major packaged-milk brands, only six met safety standards. The rest were adulterated with unsafe chemicals.

These recurrent findings point to a persistent and systemic crisis of food safety in Pakistan, particularly Karachi. When profit is prioritised over basic hygiene, protecting the health of the larger public becomes nearly impossible. The public has no choice but to pay consistently inflated prices of goods required in their daily lives, and that too without peace of mind regarding safety and hygiene. When faced with such a situation, one does question - what is the point of opting for organic over processed food when at the end of the day, both are harmful to human health?

The government must forsake sporadic testing that yields no substantial change in the supply chain. It needs to enact a robust regulatory framework that maintains hygiene standards and routinely conducts unannounced audits of suppliers. Consumers must also demand such regulation from the government. Otherwise, organic food will merely become a marketing tactic.