The misuse of antibiotics must stop if safe food is to be produced, State Minister for Fisheries and Livestock Sultan Salauddin Tuku said on Thursday, 17 September. Speaking as chief guest at a workshop in the PTI auditorium at Gazipur Sadar on enforcing the Fish Feed and Animal Feed Act 2010 and tightening quality control for safe animal protein and export capacity, he said cutting production costs in poultry, ensuring quality feed and giving consumers safe food need a joint effort by farmers, feed makers and the government; with that coordination farmers would profit and consumers would get safe protein at an affordable price.

Marginal farmers are the driving force of the poultry and livestock sector, he said, and keeping them in business while creating new entrepreneurs is a government goal; that is why Prime Minister Tarique Rahman has brought farmers under the farmer card, giving them the same easy-term credit, electricity facilities and incentives as crop farmers. Unnecessary antibiotics, he said, put food safety at risk on one side and raise production costs on the other, so Department of Livestock Services officers in the field must do more to make farmers aware of scientific production and proper use of medicines.

The state minister said hatching-egg exports from Bangladesh have already begun and the government is working to expand exports of animal products; it wants production costs kept tolerable and consumers supplied with safe food at fair prices. He called on the local administration and law enforcement to be more active against adulterated feed and the spread of drugs. Answering reporters, he said the government is holding regular field-level consultations to solve farmers' problems, is taking steps on production costs, easy credit and market management, and is alert to complaints of horse meat being sold in Gazipur, on which action will be taken in coordination with the authorities and the police.

The workshop was organised by the Gazipur district livestock office and chaired by Deputy Commissioner Md Nurul Karim Bhuiyan. Special guests were Md Delwar Hossain, secretary of the Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock; Md Shahjaman Khan, director general of the Department of Livestock Services; Md Shakil Ahmed, additional deputy police commissioner of Gazipur Metropolitan Police; Superintendent of Police Md Jasim Uddin; and Mohammad Anwarul Haque, general secretary of the Feed Industries Association of Bangladesh (FIAB). Dr Begum Shamsunnahar Ahmed, the department's director (extension), gave the welcome address and Dr S M Harun-or-Rashid, veterinary surgeon of Sadar upazila, presented the keynote; senior officials of the ministry and the department and local farmers attended.

Reported by Krishi Sangbad's Gazipur correspondent. Source: Krishi Sangbad