Lesson 3: Quarantine by... sight and smell?

(Baonghean) -Currently, the control of livestock and poultry slaughtering in our province is still considered a weak link. Many slaughterhouses have been built but operate ineffectively, spontaneous slaughterhouses have sprung up like mushrooms, animal and poultry meat is inspected according to the wrong process, or even sold openly without being inspected.

According to statistics, Vinh City currently has 13 large markets and many temporary markets. Every day, Vinh City residents consume over 40 tons of pork, 13.5 tons of buffalo and beef meat and nearly 1 ton of poultry meat. However, most of the meat is brought from neighboring districts to the city for consumption. Slaughterhouses in the city either operate on a small scale or have been "shelved" for a long time. Mr. Nguyen Tien Duc - Head of Vinh City Veterinary Station said: The city currently has 6 licensed centralized slaughterhouses, but currently only the slaughterhouse in Hung Chinh commune is operating and only slaughters 28-30 pigs per day. Other slaughterhouses are either degraded or located too close to residential areas, causing pollution or being caught up in planning, so they have stopped operating. Almost every ward in the city has a spontaneous slaughterhouse, but the People's Committees of the wards are almost lax and do not manage it. The control of animal meat and poultry products from the districts "smuggled" into the city is often based on the stamps and fee receipts certified by the district-level authorities. Products brought to the market by spontaneous slaughterhouses often have to follow the reverse process, that is, the City Veterinary Station staff directly bring the stamp to the market, use the "naked eye" and sense of smell to check the slaughtered products, then stamp and collect money...

In Vinh City, the issue of stamping animal meat products seems to be a distant one in rural markets. Unstamped meat is still sold, bought and used because people have long been accustomed to this method of exchange and purchase. The slaughter control work in our province has long been used to only doing the tip of the iceberg, or in other words, this work is being neglected.

Nghi Phu slaughterhouse operates "sluggishly"

With 5/6 slaughterhouses in Vinh City having to be "covered" for many reasons, the Vinh City People's Committee recently approved the project: Management of concentrated livestock slaughter in Vinh City. As the commercial center of the whole province, restoring order in the slaughter of livestock and poultry in Vinh City is a very necessary task at present. However, to increase the effectiveness of food safety and hygiene work, not only Vinh City but also the districts need to carry out synchronously, only then will the products when circulating and trading in the districts in the province be easily controlled.

Mr. Tran Minh Hanh - Deputy Head of Nghe An Veterinary Department said: Currently, in our province, there are 68 slaughterhouses built, but less than 1/3 of them are operating. Most of the slaughterhouses do not attract people to slaughter livestock and poultry, so they often slaughter at home, cannot control diseases, cause disorder and environmental pollution, causing many difficulties for slaughter control work.

Although individuals and organizations are given many incentives in terms of policies when building centralized slaughterhouses, the investment cost to open a slaughterhouse is high, people's awareness of centralized slaughtering is not high, the ability to recover capital is slow, and even losses have resulted in many slaughterhouses ceasing operations. Many spontaneous slaughterhouses have appeared, causing many difficulties in the management of livestock and poultry slaughtering.

Currently, in our province, there are still some districts that do not have slaughterhouses and have not conducted pre- and post-slaughter inspections such as: Thanh Chuong, Nghi Loc, Ky Son, Con Cuong, Anh Son... Recently, the Provincial People's Committee issued Directive 19 to deploy the construction and revival of a number of slaughterhouses in the province, but the implementation will be difficult if people do not voluntarily implement the Veterinary Ordinance on controlling the slaughter of livestock and poultry. Only when the entire political system participates, consumers are highly aware and especially the conscience of producers and processors, can we hope to minimize the unfortunate incidents caused by the use of unsafe food.
(To be continued)

Vo Van Dung