Beware The Poisoned Pineapples

"Ag, it's still nice living here in South Africa. You get such lekker fruit, like those big pineapples going cheap at my local reputable supermarket (the Pick 'n Pays, Checkers, Spars, Shoprites). Yinna, where else can you get a pineapple like that, bloody huge things for R1.99 each?"

Okay, let me tell you about this bargain.

What you are eating are poisonous canning pineapples that were rejected by the export market because they had unacceptably high levels of cadmium. That happened in July.

So the pineapple farmers, co-ops, export agents, whoever, decided that these Cayennes (the large long sour Mothers, not those cute, sweet little Queens) would have to be dumped on the South African public so they could recoup some of their losses.

No problem there. A chronic shortage of health inspectors in government at local, provincial and national level, agriculture and health ministries that are jokes, a farming community that is beleaguered, no more consumer council, no more controls, no more anything.

Omnia Holdings, which sold the contaminated fertilizer to the pineapple farmers, is still selling the same fertilizer. Expect more bargain foodstuffs soon.