Milk powder scandal set to boil over

"If this milk was really for animals, then the children's development is at risk," Pheu Thai MP Wicharn Meenchainant said. "But if this is a means to manipulate the law, then the country has been losing more than Bt1 billion in tax revenue every year".

According to him, milk powder for animal feed is not taxed, while milk powder for human consumption is.

Wicharn served as the deputy public health minister under the previous administration led by Somchai Wongsawat.

"While at the ministry, I was trying to dig deep into this issue, but my sixmonth stint was too short to sort out the problem," he said yesterday.

He also claimed that five major companies had long controlled Thailand's milkmanufacturing industry through their monopoly on milkpowder imports. "Their imports have been hurting the milk price domestically," Wicharn said.

He was speaking after dairy farmers held a protest against the oversupply of milk and a state school complained about the quality of the milk handed out by the Education Ministry.

The Medical Sciences Department is currently checking to see if the free milk meets the Food and Drug Administration's standards. However, the department's directorgeneral Manit Teeratantikanont admitted it would be difficult to determine whether the milk was fresh or had been made from milk powder.

"If we want to distinguish between fresh milk and that made from milk powder, we will need time to find appropriate methods, Manit said.