To protect consumers and maintain product quality, the National Agency For Food, Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) has met with soft drink and beverage distributors in Niger State. The agency educated them on proper warehousing practices, stressing the need for clean, safe, and compliant storage facilities to prevent contamination and preserve the integrity of drinks from factory to market.
The NAFDAC Niger State Coordinator, Pharmacist James Kigbu, stated that the engagement was aimed at ensuring proper storage, handling, and distribution of beverages in line with regulatory standards to safeguard public health.
Pharmacist Kigbu disclosed that sanctions await any distributor of soft drink found violating compliance on the laid down rules and regulations of warehousing practices.
He handed down the warming during the sensitization/stakeholders engagement with distributors of Coca-Cola drink, held in Minna on Thursday 3rd September 2026.
Pharmacist Kigbu maintained that the sensitization was aimed to create awareness on the importance of good warehousing practice, noting that the awareness is part of the regulatory functions of the agency.
He disclosed that NAFDAC recent findings of non-compliance in supply, storage and distribution of drinks and the risk to public health, pointing out that the sensitization is most important so as to enable the stakeholders align with modern day quality management system which promotes the shift from reactionary ways of doing things to proactive processes that prevent problems before they happen.
According to him, “what triggered the sensitization was as a result of consumers complaints we have been receiving of a spoiled products before their expiring date, and so many other non-conformance, which was what informed the awareness engagement”.
The Niger NAFDAC boss assured that the agency is open to render any regulatory guidance and assistance, calling for diligence from the stakeholders to be able to turn around the bad state of supply and distribution of regulatory products.
“We are hoping that in the next one month, we will begin to see compliance in all the warehouses, and already we have told the manufacturers not to supply them again until they have fully complied.
“Those that have products in their warehouses, we will allow them to go ahead and sale them, but they must not get another new supply again until they have complied”, he emphasized.
Earlier, the Chairman, Coca Cola Dealers Niger State, Engineer Ahmed Sule lamented that his members were not doing what they were supposed to do, saying that was what informed the stakeholders engagement with NAFDAC.
Engineer Sule had earlier appreciated the agency for the sensitization, promising that the distributors of Coca Cola in the state would comply with all the laid down rules and regulations of the agency.
Also speaking, the Depot Manager, Nigeria Bottling Company, Niger State, Muhammed Suleiman, revealed that the company will not supply any product that is about to expire within one month, unless the product that the distributor would be able to consume immediately. He added that without an agreement with the distributor, the company will not supply such product.
Suleiman enjoined the stakeholders to embrace the practicing of best warehousing system, urging for continue sensitization to ensure that things are done in accordance with standards.
