Date: 2018-03-05

The Federal Government has granted fifty percent waiver as registration fee payable to the National Agency for Food, and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) for small scale businesses in the country known as Micro , Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (MSME).

The Coordinator of the agency in Kwara State, Mrs Roseline Ajayi disclosed this in Ilorin , the state capital while answering questions from newsmen.

Mrs Ajayi explained that the present administration is passionate about grooming and encouraging small scale businesses such as production of liquid detergent, Gari and yam flour and announced that the registration process has been decentralized and made less cumbersome as Kwara now fails in the North Central zone with Jos as the headquarters

According to her, any stakeholder either a manufacturer or importer that is interested in the registration of any deregulated product must follow the due process and pay the official fee to guide against been shut down or persecuted stressing that the agency was not keen in killing business outfits but rather, to prompt them to do what is right to protect the interest of the citizens.

The Coordinator commended stakeholders in the state for cooperating with the agency in discharging its duties adding that since she has come on board in the state in March , 2016 , she had not had any challenge that has gone beyond the agency to handle .

Mrs Ajayi admitted that there is an increase in the incidence of drug abuse and misuse in the society but however, disagreed that there is a prevalence of adulterated drugs explaining that the agency has a formidable surveillance team across the country's that embarks on post market surveillance .

She ,however, attributed the prevalence of drug abuse and misuse to the age we are in the country coupled with unemployment , blood pressure and depression and called for prober cancelling particularly among the youths as a way out of depression.

Answering another question, the State Coordinator disclosed that the agency has overcome one of the greatest challenges it faced in terms of the production of bakery products such as bread as seventy percent of them have complied with the agencies minimum requirements such as making use of stern less facilities and maintaining hygienic premises.

Mrs Ajayi claimed that before now , most bakers use substandard facilities that can impact the quality of their bread and other related products to bake such as refuse dumps as their source of heat which are unconventional and even bake in the same location where animals are been fed and kept .

She warned that the agency would not compromise standard or do anything unacceptable that would jeopardize the health of the people that they are assigned to protect and called for the support of all stakeholders in this aspect .