CFTC probes ZAMM Investments over faulty bottled water

Manufacturers of Cool Drop water products – ZAMM Investments have decried victimisation by the Competition and Fair-Trading Commission (CFTC) after detection of visible foreign sediments inside the sealed water bottles.

However, in a statement, ZAMM Investments has maintained that immediately after the fault was detected, it conducted a comprehensive root-cause analysis.

The company added that it voluntary reported to Malawi Bureau of Standards (MBS) that it had a problem and voluntary stopped production even before the Bureau told the manufacture.

Reads the statement: “We acknowledged that we had a technical fault at our factory which led to the supply of water that did not meet certain set of standards.

“It is worth mentioning that this fault only affected few batches of 500 milli litres bottled water, which were detected with white foreign materials. Many batches and 1, 2, and 5 litres, not affected. It was just some batches of our 500 milli litres only with an issue.”

But in an interview, CFTC spokesperson Innocent Helema has said the Commission will conduct investigations on these allegations and provide updates in due course.

“Following the press release, the CFTC has received information from consumers indicating that they indeed had purchased water from the subject batches. We strongly believe that some consumers unknowingly consumed some of the affected water.

“Furthermore, some consumers have submitted that other batches, apart from the five listed batches, also have visible foreign objects. The Commission will conduct investigations on these allegations and provide updates in due course,” said Helema.

According to the manufacturer, the technical fault was resulted due to membranes that got damaged, meaning that reverse osmosis was not taking place, hence the white residues which are calcium and magnesium deposits.

In 2023, the Commission conducted investigations against Zamm Investments where it also found that several batches of Cool Drop water had foreign objects, and thus were noncompliant with consumer safety standards.