Five per cent of people suffers from sort of intestinal disorders daily in Bangladesh due to unsafe food consumption, said food secretary Md Masudul Hasan on Sunday.
Addressing a seminar as the chief guest, he also said, 鈥楨nsuring food safety remains a major challenge in our country due to various global factors. Even vegetables are being contaminated by aconite, creating obstacles to their export.鈥�
The Bangladesh Food Safety Authority organised the seminar at the lecture hall of the Super Specialised Hospital in the capital Dhaka to mark National Food Safety Day 2025, with this year鈥檚 theme 鈥楽afe Food, Healthy People鈥�.
Masudul also said that consuming unsafe food was a leading cause of malnutrition, particularly among children and pregnant women.
Presiding over the seminar, Bangladesh Food Safety Authority chairman Zakaria said, 鈥楢ccording to World Health Organisation data, 80 people die of diarrhoea every day in our country, mostly due to unsafe food.鈥�
Civil society members criticised the BFSA for lacking sufficient research and initiatives for safe food, urging the authority to test commonly consumed and popular foods and inform the public about their safety status.
They also emphasised the importance of raising awareness about food safety, particularly among those involved in food production and packaging, and the need for coordinated efforts by all the government agencies concerned to ensure food safety.
In the keynote speech, professor Khaleda Islam of Dhaka University鈥檚 Institute of Nutrition and Food Science recommended five ways to keep food safe: keeping food clean, avoiding storing cooked and raw food together, covering food while cooking, maintaining the correct cooking temperature and using safe water in cooking.
Food ministry additional secretary (administration wing) Pradip Kumar Das, Directorate General of Food director general Md Abdul Khaleque and agriculture ministry additional secretary Ahmed Faisal Imam were present as special guests at the seminar.
