Director General of NAFDAC, Prof Mojisola Adeyeye disclosed this while reacting to the report of recalled Indomie noodles by Taiwan and Malaysia authorities.
The random test, according to the NAFDAC boss, would be carried out at the production facilities and markets
“Tomorrow, May 2,2023 , NAFDAC’s Food Safety and Applied Nutrition Directorate will randomly sample Indomie noodles (including the seasoning) from the production facilities while Post Marketing Surveillance Directorate samples from the markets.
“The compound of interest is ethylene oxide, so the food lab services directorate director has been engaged. He is working on the methodology for the analysis,” NAFDAC said in a statement on Monday.
The statement added: “Indomie noodles have been banned from being imported into the country for many years. It is one of the foods on the government prohibition list. It is not allowed in Nigeria, and therefore not registered by NAFDAC.
“What we are doing is an extra caution to ensure that the product is not smuggled in, and if so, our post marketing surveillance would detect it. We also want to be sure that the spices used for the Indomie and other noodles in Nigeria are tested.
“That is what NAFDAC Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (FSAN) and Post Marketing Surveillance (PMS) are doing this week at the production facilities and in the market, respectively.”
The agency said that Nigerians will be duly updated with the outcomes of the investigation.
According to the World Health Organisation, WHO, ethylene oxide is a colourless, highly reactive, end flammable gas widely used as an intermediate in the production of various chemicals.
WHO in a report noted that findings from animal investigations, test systems, and epidemiological findings suggested an increase in the incidence of human cancer, adding that the report concludes that ethylene oxide should be considered as a probable human carcinogen, and that its levels in the environment should be kept as low as feasible.
Indomie is a brand of instant noodle produced by the Indonesian company Indofood, the largest instant noodle producer in the world with 16 factories. An estimated 15 billion packets of Indomie are produced annually. Indomie is also exported to more than 90 countries around the world.