31 January 2022 07:48 am Views - 171
By Kurulu Koojana Kariyakarawana
A sinister move to mix coconut oil with palm oil to make huge profits by an organised group of traders in the coming festive season was revealed by the Consumer Rights Movement over the weekend.
President of the Consumer Rights Movement Ranjith Vithanage told the media that they have received information about a sinister move by an organised group of importers and traders to import palm oil in large stocks to mix them with the local coconut oil production.
He said the ploy was to carefully mix the chemically enhanced palm oil with coconut oil and to release the substandard products into the market to gain huge profits.
“The demand for the coconut oil will rise in the coming festive season of Sinhala and Tamil New Year especially to manufacture a range of traditional sweets. These crooked traders will meet this demand by adding palm oil to the ‘not so much’ stocks of coconut oil and sell,” Vithanage said.
He said since it is the off-season for coconut at present, the requirement for coconut oil will highly increase in the coming weeks and it is essential for the state authorities to intervene and do an investigation on this issue.
“We request from the government to intervene and bring these organised traders to book and save the public from consuming adulterated coconut oil,” he said.