THE use of industrial standards by the Tanzania Bureau of Standards (TBS) to evaluate the work of fitness of imported foods aside from cosmetics has raised queries.

Some legislators have in previously pointed out that cosmetics are largely within the TBS grasp of standards, while evaluating foods like imported infant formula suggests something different.

A regulator would say that standards are there for everyone to see and observe their requirements, but it is hard to derive from that position that specialised regulation of foods and nutritional control, not mixing it with industrial products, is entirely irrelevant.

The bureau’s Lake Victoria zone have reported seizing such products in various parts of the regions bordering the lake, which implies that the products were already in internal circulation after being cleared at some port or other border point.

Few routine use commodities are transported by air and, at any rate, there are inspections at airports – or there are supposed to be safeguards.

In that case, the point is that the commodities were within the legal set-up of the East African customs union protocol or the common market, unless they were found to be without the legal instruments of validity.

Still, there can be errors even after goods are cleared as, for instance, expiry can’t be tested except by having overstayed in a shop.

Inspecting commodities in shops rather than at entry points leaves much to be desired, as factories are supposed to obtain standard badges from the regulator while imports are also supposed to meet standards.

That is why there is a feeling that impromptu checks interfere with the whole objective of creating a positive environment for doing business, as inspections at points of sale either check expiry or question standards checked by other regulators in other countries.

There was once a spate of moves to ban cereals at border points between Tanzania and Kenya, thereafter covering Malawi and Zambia as well, this leading to disputes as the cargo was moved in bulk across borders.

Industrial products are not moved in bulk as they are not seasonal like grain so, to cross-check the standards explanation provided, it would be crucial to have a history of the importation of the product and when the problem arose.

At times it is discovered that the checks come up after a lobby raises an issue about the need to defend local industries, and a spot check can be conducted and the necessary queries raised, action taken and the goods destroyed.

It would take plenty of time for the matter to be sorted out, as importers act alone and they would simply drop the product when the climate is not very supportive.

It is also possible for some retailers to keep expired items on the shelves if they don’t immediately show that on the outside.

However, anyone familiar with marketing or retailing would admit that it is an offence to sell expired products as that way one kicks out buyers from that shop at his own expense.

Put a little differently, it is easier for a regulator to say that a certain stock had expired than it is for a retailer or wholesaler to go on and sell such goods.

And pretexts of expiry have in the past indeed led to the vast misdirection of hospital supplies with the Medical Stores Department through gross overstating of quantities of expired medicines.