The government has embarked on a campaign to clamp down on unregistered firms distributing and selling bottled water, in an effort to restore sanity in the food industry.
Food Standards Advisory Board secretary Freddy Chinyavanhu, said unregistered bottled water companies had invaded the market, posing a major health hazard to consumers.
“After the minister (Francis Nhema)’s statement last year that there were lots of unlicensed bottled water, we decided to act.
“We also realised there was a lot of unlicensed bottled water on shelves and people were not aware there was a regulatory board that dealt with those things.
“We encourage those people who bottle water to take their water for testing so they are not struck off when we do our random pick-and- test exercise, ” said Chinyavanhu.
He said last year there were 40 prospective bottlers, but only seven had quality water.
