15/10/2008 (The News - Internatinal) - Palm oil seized by the customs authorities is of substandard quality, according to the examination jointly carried out by the Pakistan Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (PCSIR), HEJ Research Institute of Chemistry and the City District Government Karachi’s (CDGK) laboratory.

“All three reports revealed that the presence of moisture in palm oil was not according to the prescribed standard of Pakistan Standards and Quality Control Authority (PSQCA),” Special Secretary for Public Health, Dr Abdul Majid, said on Tuesday.

Speaking at a press conference, the health official said the seized palm oil was unfit for human consumption.

He said they would refer this report to the customs authorities as oil was still in their custody.

Referring to the content of the reports, he said according to the PSQCA standards, the moisture level should be .1 per cent but it was found at .3 per cent in seized oil.

Giving background of the case, Majid said a private firm had imported around 1,000 metric ton palm oil from Malaysia in the year 1999, which the customs authorities had seized on account of suspicions of its unfitness for human consumption. The firm approached the customs tribunal, which upheld the contention of the authorities. Subsequently, the case was referred to the Sindh High Court (SHC), which upheld the decision of the tribunal.

The company filed an appeal before the Supreme Court, which issued necessary instructions to the Sindh Health Department to carry out the refine process of the oil and ascertain its fitness for consumption some months ago.

The special health secretary said that “control sample” of the seized oil was drawn in the presence of experts and journalists on September 27. He said the PSQCA did not send its representative, though they were invited.

He said they carried out this exercise on the instructions of the Supreme Court (SC) and now their duty had been ended with the report of three institutions, which had found certain irregularities in the oil.

To a question, he said the health department and the CDGK had testing facility but they lacked facility of refining oil, which was a difficult process.