Not Having A Circular Permit In Indonesia, BPOM Pontianak Takes Action On Medicine And Food From Malaysia

BPOM checks on food products.

The Center for Drug and Food Supervisory Agency (BPOM) Pontianak is following up on the results of controlling the crime of illegal drug and food trafficking to pro justitia.

"BPOM in Pontianak revealed the findings of drug and food crimes that were sold online with a deposit service mode (jastip) for the income of goods from abroad to Indonesian territory," said Head of BPOM Pontianak Fauzi Ferdiansyah in Pontianak, West Kalimantan (West Kalimantan), Tuesday 8 August.

The results of the control were followed up with the pro justitia of five cases.

The progress of the five cases files includes two cases with stage II status or submission of files and suspects, one case with P21 status or complete file and two cases with SPDP status or investigation.

"Obats and illegal foods that are evidence of the pro justitia case resulting from the BPOM prosecution in Pontianak, Quarter 1 2013 amounting to Rp634 million. Meanwhile, those that were followed up with coaching amounted to Rp465 million," he said.

His party appealed to the people of West Kalimantan not to enter drugs and food into Indonesia by violating applicable regulations because they had to follow the BPOM Regulation Number 27 of 2022 concerning Supervision of the Income of Drugs and Food within the Indonesian Region.

"In accordance with the Malaysian Indonesia Socio-Economic Agreement (Sosekmalindo), medicinal products and food from Malaysia are only used for the personal needs of border communities," he said.

Ferdiansyah said BPOM continues to intensify supervision of the circulation of illegal drugs and food or without distribution permits.

"We continue to coordinate more intensively and continuously with cross-sectors related to supervision. We also continue to urge people to take drugs and food that have a distribution permit and carry out KLIK checks (packaging, labels, distribution permits, and expiration)," he said.

He said that in the first quarter of 2023, his party had found 32 cases of illegal drugs and food with a value of Rp. 1 billion. The product does not yet have a distribution permit and does not meet the provisions of the label and others.

"There are six categories of findings, namely processed food without a distribution permit worth Rp469 million, cosmetics without a distribution permit of Rp251 million, drugs without a distribution permit and without authority of Rp304 million, traditional medicine without a distribution permit of Rp69 million, supplements without a distribution permit of Rp1.5 million and quasi products without a distribution permit of Rp1.1 million," he said.

According to him, from the existing cases, BPOM Pontianak succeeded in preventing products that did not meet the label provisions and without the authority in West Kalimantan as many as 1,415 goods and 34,752 packages.

The findings without distribution permits in question consist of processed foods, namely Male Coffee++ and Malaysian Milo. Traditional drugs, namely Fat Drugs, Thin Drugs without labeling, Obsagi. Supplements, namely Collage Tati Milk, Gripe Water Oral Solution. Then, the Kuasi Products are Zambuk from Thailand and Vicks Baby from Malaysia.