State management of food safety in Nghe An province in the period of 2021 - 2023 and the first 6 months of 2024
Implementing the Law on Food Safety and Decree No. 15/2018/ND-CP dated February 2, 2018 of the Government detailing the implementation of a number of articles of the Law on Food Safety, the Provincial People's Committee has assigned and decentralized the management of food safety in the area to the Departments of Health, Agriculture and Rural Development, and Industry and Trade.
Management hierarchy
Up to now, the whole province has 48,552 food production, trading and processing establishments, including:
-Health sectorManage nearly 9,893 production, processing and business establishments. Of which, at the provincial level: issue 498 certificates of food safety qualified establishments; manage 204 food service establishments subject to certification and 105 food service establishments not subject to certification; receive 12 product declaration registration dossiers; 355 self-declarations of products; District level manage: 9,086 establishments (in the first 6 months of 2024, the district level issued 376 certificates)...
-Department of Agriculture and Rural DevelopmentManaging nearly 24,659 production and business establishments in the field of agriculture, forestry and fishery (provincial level manages 1,792 establishments, district and commune levels manage 22,867 establishments, district and commune levels mainly manage initial production establishments subject to food safety commitment). In which: Granting of food safety certificates or equivalent (HACCP, ISO 22000,...): Provincial level: Granted 1,456 establishments/1,625 establishments (accounting for 89.6%); District level: Granted 312 establishments/3,141 establishments (9.9%). Regarding the work of signing food safety commitments: Provincial level: Signed 167 establishments/167 establishments (accounting for 100%); District level: Signed 1,028 establishments/6,829 establishments (15.05%); Commune level: Signed 2,625/12,897 establishments (20.35%).
-Industry and Trade SectorManage nearly 14,000 production and business establishments, specifically: Provincial level newly issued, amended, supplemented: 242 Certificates of establishments meeting food safety conditions (still in effect); received 314 Self-declarations of products; 25 Commitments to ensure food safety; District level received): 98 Self-declarations of products; Commune level: received 11,400/13,976 Commitments to ensure food safety, reaching 82%.
Most of the establishments operating under the scope of food safety qualification certificates in the province have been granted food safety qualification certificates. However, through the supervision, inspection and examination of departments, branches and interdisciplinary teams at all levels, a number of establishments operating without food safety qualification certificates have been discovered and have beenbe punished for violations according to regulations.
Inspection, examination and supervision of food safety work
-Post-inspection, inspection and examination work in the period of 2021-2023 and the first 6 months of 2024: The whole province has established 3,287 inspection and examination teams with a total number of inspected and examined establishments of 40,573 establishments, of which 38,983 establishments passed (96.08%) and 1,590 establishments violated (3.92%) with a total fine of 3,659,224,000 VND.
Main violations: Failure to comply with legal regulations on food sample storage and three-step food inspection; Food business, display, and storage locations are infested with insects and harmful animals; Violation of legal regulations on food safety conditions in food preservation; employing people in direct contact with food without wearing full protective gear as prescribed...
The Police and Market Management forces have inspected, handled, confiscated and destroyed many items related to food hygiene and safety, and epidemic prevention, specifically: 3,474 bottles of wine, 339 wild animals, 90,820 bottles of soft drinks, 7,104 milk cartons, 3,450 kg of sugar, 33,324 kg of candy, 805 boxes of functional foods, 27,285 products of various livestock and poultry, 71,512 poultry, 250 bottles of foreign wine, 17,200 bottles/cans of soft drinks; 11,854 packages/boxes of candy;...
-Supervision: The whole province has deployed hazard monitoring for food samples, agricultural, forestry and fishery products to promptly warn consumers of the risk of using unsafe food with 1,173 samples, of which 1,103 samples passed (accounting for 94%) and 70 samples failed (accounting for 6%). For the violating samples, notifications were sent and investigation and verification teams were established according to regulations. In addition, food safety monitoring for delegations attending major events taking place in the province ensured the safety of the delegations, no food poisoning was recorded at the events; food safety monitoring during the tourist season, serving the junior high school graduation exam, university and college admissions to avoid food poisoning and food safety incidents.
-From 2021 to now, the province has recorded 06 cases of food poisoning under the management of district and commune levels with 175 people infected, no deaths (in the first 6 months of 2024, there was 01 case of food poisoning in a collective kitchen at Tenergy Garment Company, Yen Thanh district, causing 72 people to be infected).
General assessment
About the advantages:
-Based on the guidance documents and implementation of state management of food safety issued by the Government, Ministries and branches quite fully, the management of food safety in the province has been assigned and decentralized in accordance with the regulations of the Central Government. The work of ensuring food safety has received the leadership, direction and participation of the entire political system at all levels from the province to the commune level. The responsibility of the government and food production and trading enterprises has been enhanced, actively and proactively advising on the implementation of many effective solutions, contributing to ensuring food safety in the area.
-Activities to mobilize, propagate and disseminate laws on ensuring food safety are organized in many diverse and rich forms. Activities to monitor and prevent food poisoning and food safety incidents are deployed regularly, promptly detecting foods at risk of contamination to promptly warn consumers.
-Awareness and sense of law compliance of food production and business establishment owners have been gradually improved, voluntarily complying with State regulations in the process of food production and business.
-Food safety in the province has been well controlled in recent times. From 2021 to now, there has been no case of food poisoning affecting human life.
Existence, limitations:
Besides the achieved results, there are still shortcomings, specifically:
-Regarding management: The current food safety management model is not unified, management work is assigned to 03 sectors: Health, Agriculture and Rural Development and Industry and Trade, in which the Department of Industry and Trade does not have a specialized unit and is assigned to concurrently manage food safety for a functional department under the Department; the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development is assigned to 04 sub-departments for joint management. The Department of Health assigns to its affiliated departments and the Food Safety and Hygiene Sub-department. For the district and commune levels, there are more difficulties due to the lack of specialized staff to advise on food safety management. In addition, the management of food production, processing and trading establishments also involves the participation of the Environmental Police and market management forces.
-Regarding coordination: Departments and branches have coordinated in food safety management but the effectiveness is not high.
-The number of state management documents on food safety is large, issued by many entities, so there is no uniformity between management sectors, sometimes causing difficulties in searching and applying them to serve the food safety management work of the management agency and the production and trading of food by the facility. The rate of food products with standards and technical regulations on food safety compared to food products produced, traded and consumed on the market is still low.
- Regarding the construction and completion of the database on food security and safety linked with the national and specialized database system, currently the sectors update data themselves for management but there is no common system data software from the Central Government, so the connection has not been implemented.
-The current education and training on food safety is difficult to ensure comprehensive and complete training content and it is difficult for management agencies to assess the knowledge of establishments. Although awareness of the importance of food safety of food production, processing and trading establishments and of the people has been raised, there are still some areas that pose many potential risks of food insecurity.
-Some people, for profit and limited awareness, use veterinary drugs, pesticides and agricultural materials for cultivation, animal husbandry and aquaculture. Inspection of slaughter of livestock and poultry at households has not been carried out, mainly focusing on inspection and supervision at centralized slaughterhouses.
-The illegal trading and advertising of functional foods, especially on social networks, is complicated and difficult to manage, affecting consumer rights and causing public outrage.
Reason
-Nghe An is a province with a large area, large population, seaports, rivers and border gates where the circulation of goods is complicated. Mountainous terrain accounts for 4/5 of the province's total area.
-Food production and business activities are still fragmented, small-scale, and mainly individual households, so it is difficult to meet regulations on food safety conditions in food production and business as prescribed.
-In some localities in mountainous communes, food safety work is still limited, and there is no regular inspection and supervision of the implementation of food safety activities under their management. Due to the large area and scattered population, most of the personnel assigned to monitor food safety management are part-time and frequently change positions.
-Some food production and trading establishments still pursue profits regardless of the consequences for the health and safety of people and the community. The average income of people is still low, they do not have the conditions to choose clean food at high prices, and lack knowledge to recognize safe food.
-Regulations on conditions for granting food safety certificates are still general, not specific and difficult to implement in the appraisal work. In addition, the management of establishments not subject to food safety certificates is still difficult and untimely because it is not known when the establishments start operating due to the lack of regulations to notify the management agency. Some product groups do not have regulations on pollution limits, leading to difficulties in applying the establishment of product standards of the establishments and the post-inspection work of the management agency.
-Funding for food safety management is still limited and cannot meet the practical requirements of inspection, supervision, training, dissemination of knowledge on quality management and food safety, especially funding for product sample analysis and monitoring.
-There is no content framework, documents, or assessment toolset for food safety training suitable for each subject.
-Awareness, level and consumption habits of people in each locality and region are different, making it difficult to distinguish products with guaranteed quality and origin...
