A injunction has been granted banning the sale of Fonterra milk products in Sri Lanka for two weeks due to DCD contamination.

According to NZ Farmer

The National Health Services Union sought the order because there were Fonterra milk products still in the market suspected to be contaminated with dicyandiamide (DCD) despite an order from the health ministry that they be recalled. DCD is a nitrate inhibitor used in fertilisers.

Until recently NZ farmers added DCD to their land to reduce nitrogen runoff polluting waterways, the practice was eventually restricted months after Fonterra started detecting in low levels in milk samples.

The Stuff article adds

“An enjoining order was issued preventing Fonterra … from (wholesaling), selling and distributing and or selling for agents of all brands of Fonterra products for a period of two weeks,” Upul Jayasuriya, who appeared on behalf of National Health Services (Trade) Union, told Reuters last week. The court had also barred advertising by Fonterra’s milk products, Jayasuriya said.

read the full report here

A few days ago the Independent.lk wrote about the forthcoming injunction, saying independent testing had had been carried out in Thailand, milk and products came up positive. it was alleged that Fonterra had misled the public by saying the products were safe.

“The Industrial Technology Institute (ITI) and another laboratory in Thailand had tested samples of the milk products imported from New Zealand and confirmed that they did indeed contain DCD and Clostridium Botulism. Even after all these reports, the company continued to make public statements challenging the tests conducted by the ITI claiming that their products are safe. We will go to Courts against them for continuing to mislead the Sri Lankan public,” Ratnapriya told a media briefing yesterday.

Furthermore, the ITI had tested 2,000 samples of imported milk powder, and 374 of those had been tested positive for DCD, he added, urging the Health Ministry to take strong action against such multinational companies, who continued to market their products and mislead the public…”

It is noteworthy that it is a health union that brought the injunction, presumably these are nurses and infant healthcare professionals charged with the care of young children. It would be difficult to believe that they would have any ulterior motives for bringing the action and only have the best interests of their patients at heart.

Botulinum probably didn’t come from “dirty pipe” but GM feeds

A NZ vet and agricultural consultant Frank Rowson has gone on record as saying he didn’t believe the botulinum contamination was due to a dirty pipe, rather it was the end result of GM feed given to NZ to dairy herds and the increased use of herbicides. Hardly a 100% pure practice.

Rowson said: “This disease originates in contaminated feed and animal manure, and research all over the world of which I am part, shows that GM feeds and the use of increased amounts of glyphosate herbicides increases the prevalence of this disease in pigs, poultry and dairy cattle, and the neuro toxin that causes the disease will pass through the food chain into milk.”

He thought maize silage on-farm, or grains/soy in mixed rations were the most likely source of the bacterium and another was when there were pockets of contamination in wrapped silage and not enough heat to destroy the neuro toxins.

“Then it enters the food chain,” he said

“The dirty pipe would be contaminated by product from cows or water supply and the organism would multiply in the dirt in the pipe. Therefore they should be tracing back to farms or their own water supply.

“The most likely source is on farm in silage or grains/soy in mixed rations, all of which have glyphosate which stimulates growth of Clostridia and other pathogenic bacteria and fungi.

“That’s what gets into the pipes, otherwise, I hope it is not in their water.”

You can read more here http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/dairy/9041155/Vet-links-botulism-to-farms-not-pipes

Lactoferin Contamination

Also breaking in today’s dairy cock-up news: the MPI has revoked export certificates for consignments of Lactoferin headed for China. Apparently their nitrate levels were too high because of “cleaning products” One day they can’t clean properly, the next they clean too much. When is the NZ dairy industry going to clean up its act! Here’s the article in today’s Stuff.co.nz

“Cleaning products are to blame for elevated nitrate levels in a small amount of lactoferrin powder exported to China, the powder’s producer says.

The powder, made by West Coast dairy co-operative, Westland Milk Products, has been quarantined with the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) revoking export certificates for four of the company’s lactoferrin consignments…” more here