Clarification on the New Vision misleading report on Kakira Sugar

  11th September , 2019 ,       Hits: 464

Kampala, 11^th September 2019 – We are deeply concerned about the inaccurate and misleading headline in the New Vision of Wednesday 11^th September 2019.

The headline: “UNBS cleared expired sugar for sale” is damaging, blatantly deceptive and flies in the face of our mandate of protecting consumers against harmful and dangerous substandard products. We would like to urge the public to disregard it and treat it with contempt it deserves.

We undeniably state that UNBS did not clear any expired sugar for sale. The sugar in question was cleared in 2015 for re-processing as a raw material in line with internationally accepted standards. Laboratory analysis carried out before re-processing indicated that the sugar was free of heavy metals and that it did not contain any compounds that would pose a health risk to the consumer. Based on the results, re-processing was recommended with clear guidelines on how it would be carried out to safeguard the consumer.

UNBS supervised the process to ensure that the sugar was subjected to adequate quality assurance measures as per the requirements of the Standard (US EAS 749:2010) and therefore was safe for human consumption. After the sugar was re-processed, it was further tested for conformity to standards and it passed. Therefore, it is grossly inaccurate to say UNBS cleared expired sugar.   

UNBS will continue to perform its mandate of enforcing standards to protect the health and safety of consumers and the environment against dangerous and sub-standard products.

For more information, please contact:

Godwin Bonge Muhwezi,

Head, Public Relations,

Uganda National Bureau of Standards,

Plot 2 - 12, By Pass Link, Bweyogerere Industrial Park,

P.O. Box 6329 Kampala, Uganda

Tel: 0417 333250, Cell: 0700 930 996

Website: www.unbs.go.ug e-mail: godwin.muhwezi@unbs.go.ug