Pakistan Standards and Quality Control Authority (PSQCA) and Punjab Food Authority (PFA) with a view to resolving the issue of jurisdiction and technical barriers have decided to establish a joint working group. According to the PSQCA's media adviser, a decision to this effect was taken at a recent meeting held in Islamabad under the chairmanship of Federal Minister for Science and Technology Rana Tanveer Hussain.
The joint working group of law and standardisation will be headed by federal secretary science and technology while provincial food secretaries, representatives of law and inter-provincial co-ordination divisions will be its members, he added. The setting of the working group has been necessitated following an issue of jurisdiction and use of authority surfaced in the wake of their respective acts - PSQCA Act 1996 and Punjab Food Authority (PFA) Act 2011.
Citing an example of the jurisdiction issue, the sources said that although food processing was the mandate of PSQCA, the task of checking of wheat's quality fell under the Punjab government, but once the wheat was grinded, it came under the jurisdiction of the former. Similarly, PFA was responsible for checking quality of mangoes, but following extraction of juice from them or in case of change in their shape, it fell under the jurisdiction of PSQCA.
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