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Improving food safety of informally
vended foods in Southern Africa
Duration of project: 1st February 2003 to 31st
December 2004
This project is jointly managed by the Natural Resources
Institute (NRI), UK, National Institute for Scientific
& Industrial Research (NISIR), Zambia, and City
Health Department (CHD), Zimbabwe. It is funded by the
Department
for International Development (DFID) Crops
Post Harvest Programme (CPHP).
Project summary and outputs
Informal food vending is illegal in Zambia and Zimbabwe,
unlicensed vendors are excluded from government support,
and chased away from vending sites. However, economic
decline, rapid urbanization, high unemployment and the
impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic have resulted in a dramatic
increase in illegal food sellers, and recognition by
governments of both countries of the need for different
approaches to the issue of food sold on the streets.
The overall objectives of the work are to improve the
safety of informally traded food consumed by low-income
groups, and improve access to income through informally
vended food for urban poor in Harare and Lusaka.
Prior to the project little was known about the status
of the informal food vending sector in Lusaka or Harare
making it difficult to convince policy makers and implementing
agencies of the importance of the sector either in terms
of public health issues or contribution to livelihoods.
This project established vending of cooked food is well
established in Lusaka with 5,355 vendors operating around
the city. Harsh economic conditions in Harare have made
cooked food vending a growth industry, with 1,100 vendors
around the city. Cooked food vending was found to provide
a major source of employment, income and nutritional
intake for the urban poor in Lusaka. Collectively the
vendors employ over 16,000 people, serve more than 81
million meals of nshima and beef stew per year, and
make an annual profit of approximately £5.5 million
pounds. Individual profits are highly variable with
some vendors making as little as £0.1 per day,
while the most successful businesses can make as much
as £17 per day. Cooked food vending is of vital
importance for female headed households in both cities
with over 80% of vendors being female household heads
and 60% of these had no other source of household income.
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| Some markets have
only one tap for a market of 15,000 stalls. |
Monitoring of microbiological parameters from vending
sites over an 18 month period, revealed that high rainfall
in summer increases the risk of transmission of disease
through contaminated water and generally poor sanitation.
Meat stew represented the highest risk to health with
1.6% samples containing significant levels of Salmonella
spp and 14.6% of samples being contaminated with
Bacillus cereus. Water used by vendors often had quite
high bacterial counts (103-107CFU/ml) but faecal contamination
was only detected in 1.2% of samples analysed. Monitoring
of vendors hands and preparation and serving utensils
by swabs revealed very little evidence of faecal contamination
(E.coli detected on 0.6% and 1.2% of hand and
utensil swabs respectively). However, presumptive enterotoxigenic
Staphylococcus aureus were detected in 17.6%
and 18.6% of hand and utensil swabs respectively.
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| Some markets have
no drainage or floor and only two toilets for 15,000
stalls of all types. Here a customer sits next to
an open channel of stagnant water and refuse. |
A training package for environmental health officers
dealing with positive approaches to ensuring the safety
of informally vended food was developed jointly by
Zimbabwe and Zambia and used to train a total of
20 environmental health officers. The course placed
heavy emphasis on getting health officials to move
towards identification of problems and solutions at
vending sites, and positive approaches to working
with vendors.
In Zambia, new partnerships were developed between
those involved in vending and the supporting institutions.
Data collected by the project enabled the Minister of
Health to take the decision to temporarily close the
cooked food section of Soweto market early in the wet
season of 2004, and to implement project recommendations
that reduced the impact of the annual cholera outbreak
and allowed the market to re-open. In Lusaka and Harare
a total of 102 informal food vendors received training
on food safety. Vendors became highly motivated and
have taken steps not only to improve their own operations
but also to pass on information to other vendors.
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| Clean well kept stall
at Luburma market; all food items are kept covered
and surfaces are clean. |
Coalition partnership in UK, Zambia and Zimbabwe:
United Kingdom
- Natural Resources Institute, The University of
Greenwich at Medway, (Dr Andrew Graffham - a.j.graffham@gre.ac.uk)
Zambia:
- National
Institute for Scientific & Industrial Research
(Dr Rodah M. Zulu rmzulu@zamnet.zm)
- Central Board of Health; (Mr F. Nyirenda, Environmental
Health Specialist - fnyirenda@cboh.org.zm)
- Food
and Drugs Control Laboratory, Ministry of Health
, PO Box: 310138, Lusaka, Zambia.
(Mrs Margaret Mazhamo, Head, FDCL)
- Ministry
of Commerce, Trade and Industry; (Mr Boniface
Kunda, e-mail: comtrade@zamnet.zm
& bkunda@mcti.gov.zm)
- Provincial
Health Office
, Lusaka Province
/Lusaka City Council, PO Box 37136, Ministry of Health,
Lusaka (Mrs Christabel Malijani)
- World
Health Organization, Lusaka, (Mr M. Musambo, mmusambo@who.org.zm)
Zimbabwe:
- City Health Department, Harare (Mr Dombo Chibanda
- hcchd@hararecity.co.zw)
- Government
Analyst Laboratory, Harare, Zimbabwe (Mrs Pauline
Zhindi)
- Institute
of Food and Nutritional Studies, University of
Zimbabwe (Dr Tony Mutukumira - tony.mutukumira@science.uz.ac.zw
& Dr T. Henry Gadaga - tgadaga@hotmail.com
& gadaga@science.uz.ac.zw)
- Kutsaga
Research Station (KRS), Harare (Mr Oswell-Mharapara,
oswell_mharapara@kutsaga.co.zw)
- SADC
Food Security and Rural Development Hub (SADC),
Harare (Ms M. Mupotola, SPS Specialist, e-mail: mmupotola@sadchub.org)
- World Health Organization
(WHO), Harare (Dr E. K. Njelesanie -njelesanie@who.co.zw)
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