Goans are not buying fish due to formalin scare: Sardesai

Fear of formalin-laced fish is keeping away Goas from buying fish, Agriculture Minister Vijai Sardesai said here Thursday.

Addressing a national conference near here, he said fish imported from the East Coast of the country was supposedly laced with Formaldehyde which is "carcinogenic".

"How safe is food that we eat? Today, we are discussing this issue in Goa. It has become a big issue. Our staple diet is fish and we used to get it from the East Coast when there is a ban on fishing on the West Coast (during monsoon).

"That fish which was imported from East Coast was supposedly laced with formaldehyde, being used as a preservative which is also carcinogenic," Sardesai said.

He was addressing the 31st National Conference on "Agro-Tourism, Doubling of Farmers Income, Economics of Production and marketing of Cashew and Coconuts".

Sardesai said retail fish markets in Goa, especially in Margao, have become deserted because are not buying the fish due to formalin fear.

Customers are not turning up to buy fish even at the state-of-the-art fish market in Margao which was built by the state government on a Dubai model.

Sardesai's Goa Forward Party (GFP) is one of the key regional constituents of the BJP-led coalition government in the state--the other being Maharashtravadi Gomantak Party (MGP).

He said the state government had approached the Centre seeking a laboratory under the aegis of the Quality Council of India in Goa.

"I am of the view that we have to ban imports till such a laboratory is set up in Goa because safety of food is an issue...whether the food we are consuming is food or poison is a question now," he said.