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Quality control of farm products
By Siraj-ul-Hasan
In today's competitive world trade quality of product counts
most. Those countries which ignore quality lose. Take the
example of Pakistan. At the time of independence it inherited
a quality control system which was confined to meat, cream,
butter, mustard oil and eggs.
Their grading was done on a voluntary basis under a federal
law called "Agricultural Product (Grading and Marking) Act,
1937", for internal consumption, which later on was extended
to certain exportable items.
Wool was the first product for which compulsory grading was
introduced in 1954 for export purposes. Between 1954 and 1964,
three more commodities -goat hair, coriander seed and sannhemp
- were brought under the orbit of compulsory grading for
export.
In 1964, as a result of the reorganisation of various
government departments, the grading of commodities for
internal consumption was transferred to the provincial
governments. But they could not proceed satisfactorily in this
regard for want of trained personnel and this useful work came
to a standstill.
The grading of exportable commodities continued to be done by
the federal marketing department. Grading of about 20 items
for export purposes, has so far been introduced. The items are
wool, animal hair, hides and skin, potatoes, eggs, oil cakes,
dry fish/shell fish, animal casings, lamb skins, citrus fruit,
lime and lemon, chilies, fish meal, mango, dates, onion,
garlic, molasses, bones and a number of fresh vegetables.
A test house, adequately equipped with necessary testing
facilities has been established at Karachi, both for research
purposes and quality evaluations of the specified export
items.
Eight grading centres at Lahore, Multan, Sargodha, Peshawar,
Quetta, Ormara, Pasani and Gawadar have also been set up with
adequate facilities. Facilities for inspection and grading are
also provided on adhoc basis at market on request.
Such facilities have been provided so far at a number of other
places where traders, from time to time, found it convenient
to prepare their goods for export. Thus a network of such
facilities has been provided for the smooth working of the
grading activity.
Whereas preparation of goods according to the National
Standards of Quality is the responsibility of the traders, the
department provides necessary guidance and undertakes the
inspection of goods to verify their quality as per laid down
standards.
Thus inspection and evaluation involves physical examination,
chemical, physiological or microbiological testing, as the
case may be. A certificate of quality is then issued for the
consignments, which conform to the prescribed standards.
Similarly, quality control facilities are provided at other
stations from where exports are made without touching the
regular export points.
As a matter of necessity, the government's grading activity of
agricultural and livestock products is a continuous process
and more and more times are being covered under the grading
net from time to time.
Pakistan over the years has been able to establish a
scientific system of grading for export purposes, which gave
encouraging results. The major achievements of the grading
system are (i) improvement in quality, (ii) getting better
prices, (iii) increase in export volumes and (iv)
diversification of exports.
In the final analysis, quality control measures under a
well-defined system of compulsory grading have significantly
contributed towards regulating export trade in agricultural
and livestock products. Its performance can, however, improve
if financial constraints are removed.
Courtesy: The DAWN
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Pakissan.com;
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