Bread bakeries in Kenya have been put on notice over false product information. In a statement that was released by the Competition Authority of Kenya (CAK), bakers will now be required to reveal the ingredients used and the actual weight of bread. This is in a move by the CAK to protect consumers.
The CAK said that even though some bakers have been fortifying their products, they have been failing to provide such information about the specific vitamins and minerals used in the fortification of the bread.
The directive which follows investigations carried out CAK indicates adds: “the [bread] manufacturers failed to provide the weight of their bread products and ingredients, while others marketed their bread as fortified but did not specify the alleged nutrients/vitamins used. Some brands misled consumers that their products contained milk or butter whereas they did not,” read in part, the statement by CAK Director General Wang’ombe Kariuki.
In addition, the competitions regulator wants bakers to enhance safety information labeling on products.
“Specifically, the undertakings were not providing the manufacturing date/month on their bread wrappers in the prescribed format while others were printing them illegibly on the seals,” Kariuki said. “In other cases, the manufacturers omitted the applicable month in the expiry dates.”
There have been concerns that bread bakeries in Kenya were defrauding consumers by packaging bread that is underweight. This saw two people arrested in Migori last month for transporting underweight bread. The inspector in charge of commercial goods weight in Migori, Tobias Nyakamo, said when 70 samples of the packaged loaves were weighed, they weighed on average 365 grams instead of the industrially-accepted 400 grams.
