MFDA: Multiple issues in shops selling food and beverage

Maldives Food and Drug Authority (MFDA) has said that they have noticed multiple issues in their investigation of all shops selling food and beverage.

Senior Certified Officer of MFDA, Sajid Mohamed spoke to “Sun” on Thursday and said that their investigation – which started last Monday – found multiple issues with how food and beverage projects are handled in shops - related to safety, warehousing and hygiene.

“We found mostly similar issues – post control issues, and how food products are stocked up in small shops,” said Sajid.

He said that owners of shops found to have issues in their current investigation are being let off with a warning to rectify the issues, rather than being penalized.

He said that they would run a bigger crackdown later, and penalize shops that have not rectified the issues.

Director-General of MFDA, Shareefa Adam Manik also spoke to “Sun” and said that the authority did not run inspections on food items sold in shops before, but that food and beverage items sold in all shops in the country would be inspected as part of the current crackdown.

Public complaints regarding hygiene of food and beverage items sold in shops have been on the rise, with a video showing how employees of a shop “washed” fruits and vegetables sold with flood water from the street going viral on social media just last week.