KARACHI: MCC Appraisement East has issued an assessment alert advising assessing officer to be vigilant while assessing the consignment of injection for milk enhancement in animals consisting of RBST with brands namely Boostin, Somatech etc, as the same have been banned.
Deputy Collector Qasim Khokhar has noted that appraising officers concerned would refer relevant GDs of such injections to their respective principal appraisers.
However, these banned injections are being openly sold under the supervision of police.
However, these injections are being sold on exorbitant rates. Somatec and Bostan which were sold at Rs700 and now these are being sold at Rs1500 each. While Oxytocin is being sold at Rs100 each. A dairy farmer said any dairy farm could be raided at dawn to find use of these hormonal injections.
Farmers said without the oxytocin, they would have to keep the calf to get the milk from the animal, which increased the costs. Farmers are of the view, that the production would decline significantly and to meet the milk demand, there would be huge influx of synthetic milk made from even more harmful chemicals.
These hormones are banned in the EU, Canada, the UK, New Zealand, Australia and even India though it is still in use in the US where hormone-treated products are labeled and priced lower than organic products.
In Pakistan, the hormone had been in use for the past many years and its recent ban will cause a significant drop in the production of fresh unpasteurized milk.