KEBS doesn't know who imported substandard sugar

KEBS Acting MD Moses Ikiara and Quality Assurance Director Benard Nguyo when they appeared before the National Assembly Agriculture and Trade Committees Joint Committees on contraband sugar with mercury at County Hall, Nairobi. [Boniface Okendo/Standard]

Kenya Bureau of Standards (Kebs) does not know who imported substandard and contaminated sugar.

When he appeared before National Assembly’s Agriculture and Trade committees that are jointly investigating the matter, acting Managing Director Moses Ikiara could not explain the type of sugar that was imported last year.

Kebs is a State agency charged with the responsibility of ensuring products that are consumed in Kenya are of the required quality.

The committee had sought to know who imported the brown sugar that was being sold directly to consumers.

Dr Ikiara told the committee that only West Kenya Sugar Company, Sukari Kenya, Amunav Limited and Menengai Oil Refineries imported raw sugar.

However, the information contradicts a report the committee got from Kebs office in Mombasa, which showed that more than 370 companies imported brown sugar.

Brown sugar

Raw sugar cannot be consumed until it is processed, but brown sugar is fit for human consumption. “We only issued permits to four companies to import bulk brown sugar for onward processing. If there is any other company that imported bulk brown sugar, then that is illegal,” Ikiara told the MPs.

Ikiara was also unable to explain why Kebs gave importers different conditions to bring in sugar in bulk.

The agency’s Quality and Assurance Director Benard Nguyo told the committee conditions of importing raw sugar were the same.

Mr Nguyo said the importer must label the bags ‘not fit for human consumption’ and were consequently issued with a certificate of conformity. Though Ikiara and Nguyo told MPs that only four companies were authorised to import raw sugar, its document presented before Parliament indicated an individual imported bulk brown sugar.

Kebs said the sugar imported, and which had been sampled and tested, was not harmful.

The controversy over the suitability of sugar in the local market got murkier yesterday after it emerged that Kebs might not be knowing the type and quality brought in last year duty free.

In May last year, the National Treasury issued a gazette notice 4536 allowing importation of duty free sugar following a prolonged drought in the sugar belt areas.

The gazette notice did not specify the quality or quantity of sugar shipped in. It also allowed everyone, including those not licensed, to import.