FDA to sanction food vendors whose operations don’t meet safety standards

The Bono Regional office of the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) says it will, from January next year, deepen its collaboration with Environmental Health Departments of the various Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies to effectively regulate the activities of food vendors in order to check food safety and hygiene.

In this regard, food vendors who fail to meet the necessary standards set under various regulations would face the appropriate sanctions.

The Bono Regional Head of the FDA, Akua Amponsaa Owusu, said this at Odumase near Sunyani last Thursday during a sensitization drive embarked upon by her outfit.

Routine awareness creation

The programme was part of the FDA’s routine public awareness creation activities meant to educate the public on the need to look out for wholesome consumables and check the expiry dates of products they intend to buy before doing so.

As Christmas approaches, some traders intentionally sell their expired products to unsuspecting persons; thereby putting their health and safety at risk.

But the FDA says it will deal ruthlessly with anyone found to have engaged in the sale of expired products.

The Regional Director advised the public to carefully examine the expiry dates of all products they intend to buy, adding that there could be circumstances customers will rush for products without examining dates of manufacturing and expiration.

She stated that a lot of illnesses contracted by people during the festive season could be as a result of the consumption of products that are either contaminated or expired.

Vigilance

“Please, whenever you are purchasing any product, we would encourage you to spend some few minutes to check the information provided on the product label. The manufacturer is communicating vital safety and quality information to you which include manufacturing and expiry dates, storage conditions, quantity etc. You need to ensure the packaging is intact and for a canned product, there is no leakage, bloating or rusting of the can”, she further explained.

For his part, the Senior Regional Regulatory Officer of FDA, Richard Kyeremeh Yeboah, explained that food poisoning is caused by eating or drinking food contaminated with micro-organisms or germs, or by toxins produced by these germs. He added that most food contamination occurs during final preparation, transportation and storage stages.

According to him, symptoms of food poisoning typically appear between two to 72 hours and may last from few hours to few days after the infected products have been ingested.

“It's especially important that anyone whose work involves handling or preparing food stays away from work whilst exhibiting such symptoms to avoid infecting others.”