Ho Chi Minh City: Focus on solving spontaneous business and street vendors

Ho Chi Minh City monitors food safety at Binh Dien wholesale market. (Photo: Dinh Hang/VNA)

With the characteristics of moving everywhere, without business licenses or food safety certificates, controlling food safety from street vendors is still difficult. Not only does it pose a potential risk of food safety, this trading activity is also a challenge in tracing the cause when food poisoning cases occur.

The above sharing was given at the Supervision Session of the Culture-Social Committee, Ho Chi Minh City People's Council for functional departments and branches on food safety management in the city, on the afternoon of October 14.

Mr. Cao Thanh Binh, Head of the Culture and Society Committee, Ho Chi Minh City People's Council, assessed that state management of food safety in Ho Chi Minh City has had positive changes in recent times.

In particular, the procedures for controlling unsafe food have been included in the standards; coordination between departments, sectors and localities has been strengthened. Many units have had new initiatives and solutions to solve difficulties and problems in food safety control. The city has many good models such as food safety chains, food safety markets, food traceability, regional linkage chains, etc.

However, the requirements for food safety and the health of the City's people need to be put first. With the establishment of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Food Safety, all issues related to food safety need to be taken responsibility by this unit.

The Department must ensure that the processes for controlling the source of goods, from the preliminary processing stage at the source to the transportation and inspection stages at the control stations, must be strict, and that no unsafe food is left behind or leaked to consumers.

According to the Head of the Culture and Society Committee of the City People's Council, currently food at wholesale markets has been basically controlled, but in the future, the source of goods at wholesale markets needs to be controlled more strictly, ensuring quality before being distributed to other sales locations, helping consumers feel secure when shopping.

In addition, the issue of spontaneous business around markets and industrial zones and street vendors also needs to be focused on and resolved in the coming time to ensure food safety and urban order.

Mr. Le Minh Hai, Deputy Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Food Safety, reported that the Department is currently responsible for ensuring food safety at 3 wholesale markets - which supply about 70-80% of food for the city's people. In recent times, this unit has done a good job of controlling the origin and quality of food safety at the wholesale markets every night.

In addition, the Department of Food Safety also coordinates with districts to inspect and examine food production and trading enterprises in the area, avoiding missing cases of law violations.

In addition, the Department continues to focus on tracing the origin of pork and poultry eggs; coordinate with other provinces and cities and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in ensuring a safe food supply chain for the people of the City.

Food sold in front of the school gate is always crowded with students. (Photo: Dinh Hang/VNA)

Responding to the issue of food safety management for street vendors and those around school gates, Mr. Le Minh Hai said that according to Decision 19/2018/QD-UBND on the Regulations on inter-sectoral coordination in ensuring food safety, street vendors are assigned to districts for management and are not the responsibility of the Department of Food Safety. With the characteristics of moving everywhere, without a business license or food safety certificate, controlling these vendors is difficult.

Also related to the issue of street food in front of school gates, a representative of the Ho Chi Minh City Departmentof Education and Training also said that the situation of street food around schools is still common and poses a potential risk of food safety.

Not only does street vending pose a potential risk to food safety, it also poses a challenge in finding the cause when food poisoning incidents occur.

Mr. Nguyen Hoai Nam, Deputy Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Health, cited that the cases of botulinum poisoning that occurred in the city in early 2024 were due to buying food from street vendors and small retail outlets, so when the incident occurred, tracing the origin of the food to investigate the cause encountered many difficulties./.

(Vietnam News Agency/Vietnam+)

Source: https://www.vietnamplus.vn/thanh-pho-ho-chi-minh-tap-trung-giai-quyet-kinh-doanh-tu-phat-va-hang-rong-post983247.vnp