CHITTAGONG, June 26: Chittagong Fruit Traders Association (CFTA) leaders have alleged that people of local administration are harassing local fruit sellers in the name of formalin test, done with a wrong device.
They are conducting the test with formaldehyde Jet-300 machine, which is meant for measuring formaldehyde in the air, not in fruits, they alleged.
Chattagram Phal Babosaye Samity leaders said these at a press conference at the Chittagong Press Club Thursday afternoon.
Earlier on the day they observed a seven-hour strike by pulling down shutters of their shops at Phalmandi of Kadamtali in the port-city to protest the harassment and damage of fruits in the name of formalin testing.
CFTA general secretary Md Alamgir read out a written statement on the occasion, while its president Abdul Malek Chowdhury, joint secretary Fazal Karim, assistant secretary Tauhidul Alam and Md Abul Kashem replied to different queries of the media personnel.
The association presented six-point charter of demands to the government, and said they will launch nationwide protest programmes, if the demands are not fulfilled.
Md Alamgir urged the government not to damage imported fruits without testing in labs because it affects their producers, traders and importers; to let people know which fruits naturally contain how much formalin; announce all wholesale and retail fruits markets of Dhaka, Chittagong and other parts of the country formalin-free; remove contradictions and doubts among the government officials about formalin test devices; and remove fear from people's mind about existence of formalin in fruits.
He said the fruit importers import fruits from abroad following all regulations, paying the government Tk 20 billion annually as revenue.
The imported fruits are preserved in containers in prescribed environment, and then their specimens are examined in the laboratories of Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission and Department of Agriculture Extension.
If these government organisations give release order, ensuring that those fruits do not contain any harmful chemical for human body, only then they are delivered from the port, he argued.
On the other hand, different newspapers quoting the experts concerned have recently stated that the local origins of the fruits do not contain formalin, he said.
