Food Adulteration free essay sample

With a culture of malpractice seeping into every sector and level it is hardly surprising that it has reached the most important of our basic needsfood. With ineffective, outdated laws, lack of enforcement and institutional corruption there is an overwhelming indifference to consumer rights and public health. Dishonest food manufacturers and traders are having a free reign in the market adding harmful substances, selling contaminated food or tampering with the original content of the food item. The government has various bodies to control food quality. But why arent they doing their job? Every now and then we are shocked by media reports of ingenious forms of adulteration of food that we consume regularly. According to IPH (Institute of Public Health) more than fifty percent of food samples they have tested are adulterated. Food coloring is a form of adulteration. A toxic artificial dye is used to color fruits and vegetables such as melons and tomatoes to give them a rich colour. We will write a custom essay sample on Food Adulteration or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Ironically even food colour is being adulterated. Substandard food colour is finding its way into many types of food. This includes the reddish jelapi, and the saffron beguni, peaju or alur chop. Candy, chips, ice cream, chewing gum and even biryani may contain large amounts of poor quality food colour. Textile dyes such as carbide and ethopene are also being used to colour different iftar items to attract customers. Urea fertiliser is used while frying muri to whiten it. Cyanide is used to give mustard oil extra bite. Brick dust is mixed with chilly powder and a poisonous yellow colourant is mixed with turmeric powder to make it more yellow. Water and salt are also mixed with these spices to increase weight. Mangoes, jackfruit, lychees, watermelon, pineapple, papaya and bananas are artificially ripened using a carcinogenic chemical called ethylene oxide. In bananas, another chemical called Calcium Carbide is used which happens to be a sprayed Acetile-gas that releases heat, says Dr. Golam Mowlah, Ph. D. , the Professor and Director General of Institute of Nutrition and Food Science, Dhaka University. We should avoid eating fruits and vegetables which are not seasonal says Golam Sarwar, Public Analyst of DCCs Public Health Laboratory (PHL), as the chemicals are used only when the fruits are not seasonal, because chemicals also cost. It is also better to avoid grind spices or grind it in the grind er, which is available in the kitchen markets. Dalda, a vegetable based fat used for cooking is an example of one of the worst cases of adulteration. Our stomachs temperature is 37 degrees Celsius and the melting point of dalda is 54 degree Celsius. Thus there is no way that dalda can be absorbed by the body, says Sarwar. If you think fish is a healthy option think again. Many fish sellers spray fish with formalin a chemical usually used for preservation of tissues. This chemical is mainly used with imported fish and it makes the fish stiff and keeps them looking fresh for a longer duration. Research has found that there is ecoli in almost all our food items. Ecoli can be fecal, skin, hair etc. If proper sanitation codes of conducts are to be followed, these forms of contamination must be totally absent in all food items. Cooking oil that is so commonly used to deep fry items should only be used once but many food vendors and restaurants recycle burnt oil. Once the oil is used for cooking, it becomes oxidised. The more the oil is used, the more pre-oxide is created which is really harmful for the body. This gets more poisonous with continued usage.