Sale of seasonal summer fruits ripened with harmful chemical carbide continues unabated in all the markets of Narail and Jessore towns posing a serious threat to public health.

Market sources said a section of traders are selling carbide- ripened summer fruits after treating those with formalin.

Adulterated food items continue selling in the Dhaka city in the absence of proper monitoring by the agencies concerned, posing serious threat to public health.
A large number of food shops, sweetmeat houses, restaurants and producers of such foods are selling adulterated items under the very nose of lawmen, said Dhaka City Corporation officials concerned.

Nine dangerous chemicals used in farming and industry will be added to a list of banned substances whose presence in the environment causes serious health risks, more than 160 government agreed on Saturday.

The nine pesticides and industrial chemicals join 12 substances targeted for elimination under the 2001 Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs).

A small Arctic gull has set a record as the bird most contaminated by two banned industrial pollutants, scientists said on Thursday.

Eggs of the ivory gull, which has a population of about 14,000 from Siberia to Canada, were found to have the highest known concentrations of PCBs, long used in products such as paints or plastics, and the pesticide DDT.
"Environmental poisons are threatening ivory gulls," the Norwegian Polar Institute said in a statement of eggs collected off northern Norway and Russia. "Levels of PCB and DDT are higher in ivory gulls than in other Arctic seabirds."

An agricultural fair begins in Rajshahi today.