Monrovia – Marshall and Nimene Group has launched a food safety course to enable food handlers to take proper care of the food in order to reduce the risk of food poisoning and cutting down of waste.
Report by Alline Dunbar, [email protected]
Giving an overview of the program, the Central Executive officer of M&N Group Lena Marshall said food can be contaminated by improper storage, cross-contamination, undercooking and person to person contact.
“Food safety training will ensure that your staffs are aware of the ways to prevent these things from happening,” she said.
She added that there are numerous benefits of safety including improvement in behaviors and the employees of business handling food will gain a better understanding and appreciation of what they do.
“With the correct training and regular application of food safety principles, the way staff members approach food-handling will change and eventually it will simply become second nature,” she added.
The training covered different aspects of food safety including food safety procedures, personal hygiene procedures, keeping the working area clean and hygienic, receiving and storing food safely and drinking water and fresh juice manufacturing hygiene.
Also speaking at the launch, the Central Technical Advisor of the Environmental Protection Agency(EPA), Dr. Kolleh Bangura who was proxying for his boss, acknowledged that food safety is a very important issue and a lot of activities hinging on food safety falls under the EPA operational territory.
“The EPA focuses on the protection, conversation, management and improvement of the environment for the health and livelihoods of Liberians,” he said.
He added that because food is a route for microbial, chemical and physical hazards, there is concern about the transmission of multiple microbial resistant bacteria via the food chain.