The advent of COVID-19 and the resulting enhanced level of public concern has been primarily responsible for what is believed to be a healthier food safety environment, according to the outcomes of a mini survey undertaken by the Stabroek Business among food vendors operating mostly in Georgetown and a handful of communities outside the capital.
Thirty-two vendors, mostly women, who ply their trade in communities in regions Three and Four told the Stabroek Business that the advent of COVID -19 and an attendant heightened awareness of the importance of observing public health protocols have been responsible for a shift among food vendors to a higher level of compliance with food safety regulations. Many of them have even gone beyond the food safety regulations in response to recommendations from their customers, this newspaper was told.
One vendor who plies her trade in Region Three told Stabroek Business that the “customer pressure” resulting from an enhanced level of popular awareness of the likely link between the advent of the pandemic and the need to raise food safety standards had served to “put pressure” on some vendors to raise their food safety standards.
“Vendors started to look at how the competition was responding. They made moves in the right direction because they realised that the customers were patronising vendors that seemed to be making some kind of effort to improve their food safety standards,” another Region Three vendor told this newspaper. Another vendor from the same region told the Stabroek Business that she believed that the long-standing relationships between customers and vendors did much to bring about a change. “As vendors we listened when our customers made suggestions,” she said.
And in response to a question raised by this newspaper, the overwhelming majority of the vendors interviewed said they believed that the food safety concerns that have been raised during the period of the COVID-19 pandemic had done much more than the various efforts made by the regulating agencies to raise the level of food safety awareness among food vendors.
One vendor told the Stabroek Business that he believed that “customer pressure” had done “far more” than “official pressure” to change vendor attitudes to food safety. He said that part of the reason for this had to do with a lack of consistency in the official measures that were being taken to improve food safety practices. “The thing about COVID is that we know it is out there. And when you look at how your customers are responding you are forced to take actions to help their confidence in what you are offering.”
During the informal survey conducted over the past seven weeks, vendors drew the attention of this newspaper to specific food safety measures that they had employed that had not been in place before. Some of those included greater protection for uncooked foods, constant washing up of used utensils and enhanced attention to the state of the surroundings in proximity to the areas in which they were plying their trade. Most vendors said that mask-wearing, hand-washing and sanitising, had become commonplace in the food-vending community. “Some of the vendors are finding it difficult to mask up when they are preparing food. They have no choice,” one Georgetown vendor told the Stabroek Business.
In an invited comment sought by the Stabroek Business, Director of the Government Analyst Food & Drugs Department (GAF&DD) Marlan Cole said in a note to this newspaper that the issue of food hygiene protocols for food vendors in the prevailing covid-19 climate had come under scrutiny at the October 12 monthly meeting of the National Food Safety and Control Committee where, arising out of a presentation made by Chief Meat and Food Inspector Onika Alleyne, a question had arisen regarding “the response to food safety requirements by Food Vendors in the light of the covid-19 pandemic insofar as compliance was concerned. According to Cole Ms. Alleyne had pointed out that many of the requirements which the public health authorities had articulated over the years, prior to the advent of the covid-19 pandemic, “particularly regular sanitation, hand washing, garbage disposal and the wearing of protective clothing are now, to some measure, being fully adhered to due in part to covid-19 measures / pandemic. Nevertheless, there is much more that vendors need to do to protect the food itself from temperature abuse,” though he added that the “positive measures and practices” currently in place, “are welcomed by the NFCC.
