Dumping of poor quality and/or unwholesome food to rapidly growing areas

Chiara Frazzoli

Lose of food sovereignty with massive and uncontrolled importation of staple foodlike chicken, rice and milk has negative implications on economy, activities of small farmers, with rural-urban migration and abandon of agriculture villages, as well as on public health.
“We do not eat what we produce because so many products are imported and consumers have developed a liking for these products, which are available and less expensive” (ACDIC, Cameroon, http://www.postnewsline.com/2008/04/cameroon-is-los.html;http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,506742,00.html). An example that has received recent media attention is the massive imports of frozen chicken in Cameroon. The product is sold at a very low price on local markets in disastrous sanitary conditions, creating severe problems to local poultry breeders. The Cameroonian ACDIC (Association for the defence of collective interests) campaigns against the import of frozen chicken meat and, whereas attention has been provided to the immediate health risk associated with microbial contamination of thawed and refrozen chicken, no data exist on longer term risks such as those deriving from the use of preservatives.