I begin this write up with a personal experience. After a terrible night occasioned by relentless mosquito bites a couple of weeks back, I went to a neighbourhood store to buy insecticide, any insecticide for that, that would keep these insects at bay and allow me the benefit of a good night’s sleep after a hard day’s job.
At the shop, an array of brands (if you could call them by that name) lined up the shelf. I picked three of them and began asking the shop owner which one of them would work.
And to my consternation, the man could offer no help.
But while I was fishing out money from my pocket to pay, a young man walked in and, as if we were reading from the same script, picked up about three brands of insecticides and asked the same questions I had asked earlier. And he got the same response.
This got me thinking. Is it that insecticides are made never to work? I have heard several theories about mosquitoes adapting to the harsh smell of insecticides and so are immune to their effects but I refuse to believe that having known this, the makers of these “mis-functional” products still tell us that their brands kill this and that insects with undisputable finality.
So I began to look the way of those whose job it is to make these manufacturers conform to agreeable standards. On all these products are Nafdac registration numbers.
I was forced to conclude (and I stand to be corrected) that Nafdac registration numbers have become more or less a revenue receipt than a compliance endorsement. So I began to think that perhaps there must be another agency that should ensure conformity to the Nigerian standard (whatever that means).
So I, along with my colleague in the office, prepared a simple questionnaire for the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON). We raised seven simple questions. We wanted to know if goods produced and imported into Nigeria comply to minimum standards of quality and quantity?.
Nearly three weeks have passed and there have been no response. In this edition, we begin a series on products and product categories where there are the public agree standards are not complied with and the particular brands that are culpable:
Mortein
Reckitt Benckiser is a well know multinational company operating in Nigeria known for manufacturing several brands. Previously known as Reckitt & Coleman, this company in the past was big and heavy in the personal care and household products categories.
Mortein is an insecticide brand they produce. The last time I used this brand of insecticide was two weeks ago and it just did not work. I sprayed a whole can in one night and when the horrible smell was gone, I went to sleep and still had mosquitoes roaming free. When I woke, I picked up the empty can and read what Reckitt Benckiser said Mortein could do.
I read that Mortein kills mosquitoes twice faster than competing brands. I read that it kills all insects. I read that it kills instantly on direct spray. Well Mortein does not kill any insect at all from my experience. And the suggestion of spaying directly cannot work. Insects hide in crevices and dark corners in the house. Is Reckitt Benckiser suggesting I issue a search warrant on mosquitoes, find them arrest all of them and spray directly on them like someone in the old American gas chamber?
Spray insecticides are gaseous and should kill by smell and not direct spray. Mortein does not work.
Flit
Mobil Oil Nigeria Plc has been in the business of making insecticides for as long as can be remembered. Back in the days, you either bought Mobil or Shelltox. And when you spray them in your house, every insect gets into a dirge because they are bound to die.
Not anymore. Flit is a new name coined when Mobil insecticide gained notoriety for not delivering results. Consumers took flight and to get them back, the marketing people at Mobil changed the name of the product from Mobil insecticide to Flit.
But like Mobil, Flit is still an underperformer. But while this brand is better than Mortein since it could at least get some of the insects (mosquitoes mainly) to sleep, they resurrect after some hours and begin their blood sucking works with renewed vigour.
Baygon
This brand was a master insect killer at a time. Today, it has receded into the category of the “have-beens.”
Baygon soared in reputation a couple of years ago and was rising high to the point where it was becoming a generic name for insecticides in the market. Although its smell is very strong, (sometimes too strong), people liked it because it got the job done. Most folks would not mind waiting the long hours it takes to diffuse before going back into the house. But like everything in Nigeria, this brand soon caught the bug. It began with speculation that there were fakes in the market. You could see desperate people hawking the brand on slow moving traffic and at prices lower than real market values.
But whose job is it to track and shut down these counterfeiters? The point is even that as much as we can accept the prevalence of fake Baygon brands in the market then, the brand itself at a point began to tone down on quality and, like others, stopped killing these insects with the alacrity of the days of old.
Rambo
Sylvester Stallone, American body builder and ace movie star would cry when he sees this brand that was named after the name of the character that made him popular worldwide.
Rambo, the movie character was a ruthless person that killed his enemies without leaving any one behind. In “movieland”, his name sent jitters into enemy camps. And so, to ride on the popularity and efficacy associated with this name, someone was smart to name an insecticide brand after him.
In came Rambo the insect killer. But does it kill? Your guess is as good as mine.