The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has said it will no longer approve registration for alcohol packaged in sachets.

The Director General of NAFDAC, Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, made this known recently in Ibadan at an interactive session with stakeholders in food and drugs manufacturing.

The regulatory agency head said that it has identified alcohol packaged in sachets as greatly contributing to increasing drug and alcohol abuse in the society.

Adeyeye added that the agency would in the next five years phase out the use of pet bottles used in packaging of alcohol to address the increasing spate of abuse in the country.

She vowed that the agency remained undaunted in its efforts to reduce the incidence of substandard and falsified products as well as the smuggling and abuse of various products.

Answering questions on why NAFDAC was not giving full registration status to herbal medicines, Adeyeye said the agency was keen on having such medicines widely accepted as safe hence will continue to test them for clinical efficacy before giving full registration status.

“We are also on a mission to turn herbal medicines into products that can be commercialised through collaboration between traditional herbalists and academic researchers.

“In encouraging local manufacturing of medicines that are usually imported, the agency will enforce a five- year importation permit given to manufacturers with a mandate that they produce five years plan geared towards local manufacturing upon renewal.

“In addition, the agency will also give five-year exclusive rights to companies to market their products without competition if they develop food and drugs that show demonstrable research and development innovation.

“This development will be effective before the end of the first quarter of the year,” she said.