Pretoria | Tuesday
SOUTH African maize producers on Monday expressed amazement at a report that maize exported to Malawi was contaminated with hallucinogenic wild black seeds.
”It’s a total mystery to me,” said Grain SA general manager Steve Shone.
”Maize produced in this country is stored under strict conditions in silos. From our point of view it is highly unlikely that the maize could have been contaminated on this side.”
The French news agency AFP reported a Malawian food safety official as saying that hallucinogenic wild black seeds had been found in maize imported from South Africa.
Harold Williams, who chairs a state-run bureau of standards for food safety, told the agency that tests had also discovered small wild dried fruits in the grain.
When the contaminated grain was milled into flour and cooked, it ”drove people crazy”.
”Further tests of the black seeds revealed that they contained ketone compounds deemed not suitable for human consumption,” Williams said.
Shone said it was not impossible that maize exported from South Africa could have been contaminated after it had left the country.
There might also be mischief behind the allegations.
”There are often spurious attempts to undermine the export initiative,” Shone said.
Officials at the National Food Reserve Agency (NFRA) in Malawi have challenged the assertions that some maize from South Africa was contaminated.
”The public is assured that the maize undergoes rigorous checks and monitoring from origin in South Africa, in transit and to points of delivery in Malawi,” NFRA said in a statement, questioning the scientific basis of the bureau’s finding.
Malawi has reportedly imported more than 50 000 tons of maize out of a total requirement of 180 000 tons from South Africa after flooding destroyed most maize crops in that country last year. – Sapa