Ensuring safe food for people :

CMC puts kitchens under microscope

Rasika SOMARATHNA

Over 500 Kgs of Kottu Roti not fit for human consumption was destroyed, four restaurants which used tube well water to prepare food were also closed down yesterday, as raids by the Colombo Municipal Council (CMC) health officials revealed more shocking hotel kitchens in the city.

Public Health Inspectors assisted by law enforcement officials are conducting inspections on city hotel kitchens to ensure that the owners adhere to set hygienic standards when preparing, storing and serving food to customers, CMC Chief Medical Officer, Dr Pradeep Kariyawasam said.

He noted that many hotel kitchens in the city had been found unhygienic and dirty totally unfit for making food.

Using water from tube wells to prepare food in the Colombo area is illegal as underground water in Colombo is polluted, he added. According to him, the CMC has initiated legal action against 212 hotels and restaurants so far which had served unhygienic food.

Food and water samples obtained from another 300 are under the microscope, at present.

According to Dr Kariyawasam officials would not hesitate to initiate legal action against any outlet if found to be preparing, serving or storing food under unhygienic conditions.

From Five Star hotels to small outlets, popularly known as Duwanagiri Hotels' (Meals on Wheels) which spring up in all corners of the city, especially during evenings would come under the scanner in a bid to ensure safe food for the public.

Dr Kariyawasam said though the exterior of certain famous hotels and restaurants in Colombo appear to be clean, the kitchens are not.

He stated that when the health officials inspected five star hotel kitchens ten years ago in the city, the officials had found that most of them did not have a piece of soap in their kitchens.

However, things have changed for the better now with greater awareness and now we have more than 150, A-Grade hotels in the city, he added.

The Doctor was of the opinion that although Sri Lanka had passed the Food Act in the 1980's (even before UK) to ensure safe food for the public, relevant authorities had failed to strictly impose regulations.

Today anybody can open a catering establishment within hours, he added.

The number of food poisoning cases which come up almost on a daily basis was the result of consuming unhygienic food, he noted.

He observed that plans were afoot to rectify anomalies and strictly impose rules and regulations to provide safer food for the public.

He said that from Five Star Hotels to small outlets in Pettah had been advised to abide by the rules or face severe penalties.

The authorities have launched a program to evaluate food standards of catering establishments to help public identify places which serve food under good hygienic practices.

The project called 'Crowns for Food Hygiene' is a voluntary practice which would encourage food catering establishments to practice safer food hygienic practices with continuous enhancement of hygienic conditions at their establishments and thereby offer safer food to their patrons.

The catering establishments under the program would be categorised into five tiers and the information would be displayed at the relevant hotels, internet, advertising etc.