Food hygiene is often poor

Federal Office uncovers mass hygiene deficiencies in food

27/10/2011

Hygiene deficiencies are alarmingly widespread in the food and beverage industry as well as in the catering industry. For example, the Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food Safety (BVL) detected deficiencies in every fourth company visited in the past year.

Breaches of hygiene rules were the most common cause of the contested infringements. Thus, about 75 percent of the complaints were on „Faults in the industrial hygiene and shortcomings in the hygiene management“ The President of the Federal Office for Consumer Protection and Food Safety, Dr. Helmut Tschiersky-Schöneburg, yesterday in Berlin.

Alcoholics and meat products are the most frequently objected to
The inspectors of the BVL carried out a total of around 921,000 inspections in approximately 538,000 companies in 2010. 408,000 food and catering samples were analyzed, with 13 percent of the samples being objectionable due to significant deficiencies, according to the latest release from the BVL. In this case, errors in the labeling were cause for complaint in about half of the samples sent in, with a fifth of the inspectors „microbiological contaminants“ The goods were contaminated with germs or already spoiled. The most worrisome was the situation in the controlled restaurants without full kitchens (classic pubs) where 27.1 percent of the farms according to the Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food Safety had significant deficiencies. The controlled goods, according to Dr. Helmut Tschiersky-Schöneburg alcoholic beverages - except for wines - the most frequent reason for complaint. Thus, 19 percent of the alcohol samples were criticized. Closely behind the complaints were the meat products, in which the controlled samples did not meet the requirements of the inspectors at 18.9 percent. Although the number of complaints as a whole decreased slightly in 2010, the hygiene deficiencies are still far too often a cause for complaint, especially as serious health risks can be associated with the violations for the consumers, according to the experts.

Improvement of the technical equipment required by food inspectors
In order to improve the controls in the interests of consumers, according to the statement of the BVL President Helmut Tschiersky-Schöneburg also has a lot to do on a technical level. So the food inspectors are still technically poorly equipped and have no digital recording system in which the companies are involved, complained Tschiersky-Schöneburg. According to the expert, this should be implemented to be able to react as quickly as possible even in crisis situations. The importance of quick action has been demonstrated, for example, by the dioxin findings earlier this year and the EHEC epidemic. For example, after many EHEC symptoms began to appear, inspectors had long to trace the supply chains in order to find the culprit and to protect the population from health risks, explained the BVL President. This would have been much easier with a digital system in which companies are involved, said Dr. Helmut Tschiersky-Schöneburg.

Hygiene traffic light should make control results transparent
In order to make the hygiene situation with the food manufacturers and in the catering trade also transparent for the consumers, the experts also demand a corresponding public marking of the enterprises. In this way, customers could clearly understand which companies work cleanly and which do not, according to the opinion of consumer advocates. In order to get closer to the ambitious goal, the Consumer Conference had already agreed in the middle of the year, a „Hygiene-Ampel“ introducing a three-level scale of the hygiene situation in the holdings. However, some Ministers of Agriculture have opposed such a scheme because they fear significant business disadvantages for many companies. Since the agreement, no further steps have been taken to introduce the hygiene traffic light. Consumer protection organizations such as Foodwatch have been calling for years a labeling of the hygiene situation in the plants in the form of a hygiene barometer, which would work in the opinion of the experts both as a traffic light but also as a smiley system. Because only when the results of food inspectors „also be published, right at the entrance of restaurants, bakeries and supermarkets, consumers have the choice between the good and the bad farms“, stressed Foodwatch spokesman Martin Rücker.

Results of food controls communicate openly
The arguments of the Ministers of Economics against the introduction of a hygiene traffic light can not apply in the opinion of the consumer advocates, because who slaves with the hygiene, which must also expect financial disadvantages and falls in sales. In the inspections in every fourth pub significant deficiencies were demonstrated speaks in the opinion of the consumer advocates for themselves and is the best argument to finally implement the adopted hygiene traffic light. According to the latest communication from the BVL, the consumer protection ministries of the federal states are also in favor of publication of the results of the inspection. For example, the deputy chairman of the consumer protection working group from the Brandenburg Ministry of Consumer Protection, Bernhard Remde, said that such a publication would certainly have positive effects. Even today, the state enforcement authorities are already devoting attention to hygiene deficiencies „great attention“ especially what „a more frequent control“ of plants with complaints „in the context of risk orientation and consistent enforcement of regulatory measures“ concerns, explained Remde. But in the interests of consumers, the results must also be communicated, according to the expert. (Fp)

Image: Cornelia Menichelli