No picture of fruit be printed on flavoured drink packs: NA body

ISLAMABAD: The National Assembly’s standing committee for food security was briefed over flavoured drinks in a meeting on Monday.

“Mango used to be printed on a flavoured drink without its ingredients in the drink, it only happens here,” Rana Muhammad Hayat said in meeting. “Such factories should be sealed,” he urged.

The representative of the Pakistan Standards and Quality Control Authority (PSQCA) said that the picture of a fruit could not be printed on the flavoured drink, and a printed warning should also be written on the pack that the children below 13 years should not use it.

The NA committee’s chairman suggested that the warning, ” Flavoured drinks are not good for feeding mothers and pregnant women, should also be printed on the pack”.

The Secretary National Food Security said that a caution against increased use of flavoured drinks should also be written on the pack.

Minister for National Food Security Rana Tanveer Hussain observed in the meeting that most bottled waters found to be substandard.

The NIH official told the meeting that the water in plastic bottle if kept more time under the sun, could cause cancer.

The meeting decided to include the committee members as observers in the technical committee over the flavoured drinks.