How fruit vendors are killing you softly.
Everyone
loves fruits for they are extremely good for our health due to their high
nutritional value in vitamins and other nutrients that are essential for our
growth and development.
Doctors
say that consuming fruits is one of the best ways to stay healthy. However, the
health benefits of fruits are threatened by human greed.
It has been discovered
that some unscrupulous fruits vendors are using potentially
harmful compounds to ripen the fruits.
Investigations
have unearthed rampant use of calcium carbide (CaC2) - an artificial ripening
agent that
has carcinogenic properties that are cancerous, putting the lives of millions
of people at risk of an early grave.
Artificial
ripening of fruits is done to achieve faster and more uniform ripening characteristics
at the cost of its nutritional values.
Samples
taken from three leading supermarkets and groceries in the country tested
positive for the poisonous chemical used for welding and for making plastics. Wholesale
traders in big fruit markets in Gikomba, Nairobi, Marikiti and Kongowea in
Mombasa are also said to be using the chemical secretly.
Fruits
adulterated with calcium carbide have also found their way to Kenya from other
parts of the world as there are no laws governing its use. Some of the mangoes,
bananas, oranges and apples in the Kenyan market are imported from Tanzania,
Uganda, South Africa, Egypt and as a far as India where calcium carbide use is
rampant.
Calcium carbide is said
to be hawked at the busy Gikomba market for as little as Sh20 a sachet. These traders
wrap a small pellet of the chemical in a small paper and put it next to the
pile of fruits. This way the fruits ripen within one or two days.
CaC2 is a known
carcinogen - an agent having the ability to alter human cells into cancerous
cells. Calcium carbide is
extremely hazardous to the human body as it contains traces of arsenic and
phosphorus.
When consumed, the
chemical is known to cause ulcers, “a burning sensation that may also be
accompanied with diarrhea and vomiting. CaC2 can also leads to skin allergies
and rashes and at times can also cause a severe disease like skin cancer.
The chemical also accelerates aging and can lead to miscarriages
in pregnant women or the child born with deformities.
Since most of the fruits procured from the market are artificially
ripened, the only way to skim the carbide content is to wash the fruits
properly.
How to identify
Artificially Ripened fruits?
You have probably peeled a uniformly yellow
usually unblemished banana or mango only to find green raw tissue inside. This
is just one of tell-tale signs of chemical ripening.
Naturally ripened bananas for example are not
uniformly yellow, they are green and yellow. They are not uniformly coloured;
rather, they are patchy.
On the other hand, artificially ripened fruits
that look very attractive from the outside and have a uniform colour are more
likely to have been artificially ripened.
If the stem is dark
green but the fruit is yellow, chances are high that it is artificially
ripened. Uniformly red tomatoes or uniformly yellow or orange mangoes may also
have been artificially ripened.
For example,
artificially ripened mangoes will be green and yellow in patches around the
surface. This may be because they have been treated and the chemical has not
reached the entire fruit. The fruit gets the yellow colour, but since the fruit
sugars remain immature, it does not taste sweet. The flesh will also not be fully
ripe inside. The artificially ripened fruit will be dry and less juicy as
compared to a naturally ripened one. They will also not have the sweet aroma
that comes with a natural fruit.
While purchasing
fruits and vegetables, remember not to select those that are homogenously
ripened and with bright, eye-catching colours.
The habit of washing
and peeling before eating the fruit could help in minimising the health risks
associated with the use of Calcium Carbide. It is better to cut the fruit into
pieces, rather than to consume them directly. And it is not also advisable to
buy fruits when they arrive in the market before the due period i.e. early and
offseason.
Cancer is the third
killer disease in Kenya. According to the Nairobi Cancer Registry, 38,544 new
cancer cases were diagnosed in 2012 with 26,941 deaths occurring in the same
year.
Unfortunately, little
is done to ensure food safety for food distributed in the country said the
official. Regulatory authorities suffer from incoordination and there is little
surveillance carried out on food being sold within the country. Most of them
are made in very poor conditions and sometimes dangerous chemicals are used.
Every trader wants to make quick money especially when demand is
higher than the supply. The rush to make quick money is creating a lot of
problems for us.
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