To describe the general knowledge and practice about the inspection profession of officer in food safety inspection in 30 provinces/cities. Subjects and method: Using the crosssectional descriptive method. Direct interview of research subjects with pre-designed questionnaires.
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SITUATION OF KNOWLEDGE, PRACTICE ON THE INSPECTION AMONG CIVIL SERVANTS CARRY OUT THE FOOD SAFETY
INSPECTION IN 30 PROVINCES/CITIES
Tong Tran Ha 1 ; Nguyen Thanh Long 2 ; Le Van Bao 3
SUMMARY
Objectives: To describe the general knowledge and practice about the inspection profession
of officer in food safety inspection in 30 provinces/cities Subjects and method: Using the cross-sectional descriptive method Direct interview of research subjects with pre-designed questionnaires A total of 338 subjects participated in this study Results: Regarding knowledge related to "The content of specialized inspection of food hygiene and safety": most of subjects' knowledge about the contents in this section was quite low, all of them were below 50% Less than one-third of subjects (32.54%) correctly answered ≥ 50% of questionaires about general knowledge (32.54%) In practice field: 3.55% of subjects had not been involved in inspection 6.75% of them could not get the main sample due to "Restrictions of equipment and essential tools for sampling and preservation" (77.27%), "No sampling certificate" (55.55%) and "Due to limited capacity, understanding of food sampling and preservation" (36.36%) Only about 47.04% of subjects correctly answered ≥ 50 or more practical questionnaires Conclusion: Knowledge and practice of food safety inspection officers of 30 provinces/cities is still relatively limited Therefore, it is necessary to take some solutions such as training on specialized and regular specialized inspection
* Keywords: Food inspection and safety operations; Knowledge; Practice; Food safety
INTRODUCTION
Food safety has a direct and regular
impact on health, even the lives of users,
in the long term also affects the ethnic race
In term of a socio-economic perspective,
food safety has a great influence on
economic development, trade, tourism and
social security
According to a report by the Vietnam
Food Administration and some studies,
the number of cases, food poisoning
cases and deaths were still high (from
2000 to 2010, there were 2,147 cases
of food poisoning) with 60,602 cases and 583 deaths [1] In fact, the number
of cases of food poisoning were many times higher than the number of cases was detected and recorded [2, 3] The results of inspections in 10 years (2001 - 2010) showed that the violation rate of food hygiene and safety at inspected establishments was about 20 - 30%
1 Ministry of Health
1 Central Propaganda and Training Commission
3 Vietnam Military Medical University
Correspoding author: Tong Tran Ha (tongha82@gmail.com)
Date received: 19/06/2019
Date accepted: 06/08/2019
Trang 2The contents of violations were mainly
detected during the process of major
inspection and examination of violations
of basic sanitation conditions, violations of
equipment, tools and violations of people,
violations of labeling, advertising food,
non-quality food, unknown origin, origin
The above situation showed that the
quality management of food hygiene and
safety still has many shortcomings, including
causes related to capacity (knowledge
and practice) of civil servants performing
inspection work Therefore, in order to
assess the overall and objectively the
capacity of civil servants who performed
the specialized inspection of food safety,
thereby serving as a basis to come up
with appropriate and effective interventions,
this study was carried out with the goal:
To discribe the situation of knowledge,
practice on the inspection among civil
servants who carried out the food safety
inspection in 30 provinces/cities in 2012
SUBJECTS AND METHOD
1 Subjects, location and time of
study
- Subjects: Civil servants specialized in
food safety inspection at the provincial/city
level, including the Department of Health
Inspectorate and Sub-Department of Food
Hygiene and Safety of the selected
provinces
- Location: The study was conducted in
30/63 provinces/cities, divided into three
regions (North, Central and South),
including: Northern (12/25 provinces/cities):
Hanoi, Hanam, Namdinh, Vinhphuc, Phutho,
Tuyenquang, Hoabinh, Sonla, Dienbien, Haiduong, Haiphong, Quangninh; Central region (10/19 provinces/cities): Quangbinh, Quangtri, Thuathienhue, Binhdinh, Phuyen, Khanhoa, Binhthuan, Daklak, Daknong and Lamdong; Southern (8/19 provinces/ cities): Hochiminh City, Dongnai, Binhduong, Tiengiang, Bentre, Cantho, Vinhlong, Dongthap
- Research period: From November to December 2012
2 Method
- Study design: The cross-sectional descriptive method
- Sample size and sample selection: Assigning 30 provinces/cities based on
the request of the Vietnam Food Administration, Ministry of Health Choosing 30 provinces/cities by single random method
n = Z2(1-α/2)
2
) 1 (
d
p
p −
Inside:
+ n: Minimum sample size
+ α: Significance levels (α = 0.05)
+ z: Reliability taken at the probability threshold, α = 0.05, Z(1-α / 2) = 1.96
+ p: The rate of estimating civil servants correctly answered ≥ 50% of knowledge questions Since there was no similar study,
p = 50% should be taken (p = 0.50)
+ d: Relative error, expected d = 5% (d = 0.05)
Replacing the values in the formula to calculate n = 384 In fact, at the time of investigation, the number of civil servants
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was present in 30 selected provinces/
cities of 457 people, including 119 civil
servants being leading officials and 338
civil servants accounting for over 95%
of civil servants were employees of
Inspectorate of Department of Health and Sub-department of Hygiene and Food Safety In this study, we only analyzed the knowledge and practice of the inspection profession of civil servants
Table 1: Number of civil servants in 30 provinces/cities (n = 338)
Province/
Thienhue
- Variables and indicators: Knowledge
about inspection: responsibilities of inspected
units; contents need specialized inspection
of food safety; people had the right to
sanction administrative violations of food
safety violations; general assessment
of inspection professional knowledge
Practice on inspection profession: Type of
establishment that has ever participated
in inspection; ability to perform test
samples; work/content prepared; what
has actually been done in conducting
an inspection; general assessment of
inspection operation practice
- Methods and techniques for data
collection: Direct interviewed with civil
servants working on food safety inspection with pre-designed tools When asking, did not read the answer, but just read the question and let subjects thinking by themselves and gave the answer
- Data processing methods:
+ Data were entered with Epidata 3.1 software and were analyzed with Stata software 14.0 Using descriptive statistical tests to analyze results Using frequency tables, charts to describe frequencies and rates according to research variables + To calculate the rate of achieving knowledge and practice in two levels: the group reached ≥ 50% of the correct answers and the group reached < 50% of
Trang 4the correct answers The questions asked
about making consciousness and practice
were equally important
- Research ethics: The subject were
fully explained about the content and
purpose of the study All study subjects confirmed voluntary participation All information of the subject was kept confidential and only for scientific research purposes
RESULTS
1 Knowledge about inspection profession of civil servants who carried out the food safety inspection
Table 2: Knowledge about the responsibility of the food safety inspection unit (n = 338)
1 Appointing authorized person to work with inspection/inspection team 188 55.62
2 Providing full information, documents and timely reports at the
3 Be responsible before the law for the information, documents and
4 Strictly abiding by requests, proposals, decisions and conclusions
Knowledge of civil servants about the responsibility of the inspected unit: knowledge about the sub-item "The dispatch of a person with authority to work with an inspection/inspection team" was the highest (55.62%), the lowest was sub-items of units to be examined need: "Strictly comply with requirements, recommendations, decisions, conclusions about inspection and inspection (41.12%)
Table 3: Knowledge about content of food safety inspection (n = 338)
1 The implementation of standards, technical regulations and
Knowledge of civil servants about "The content needs specialized inspection of food hygiene and safety: Most of the knowledge of civil servants about the contents in this section was quite low, only reaching less than 50%, of which the lowest was about the subsection: "Jobs implementing standards, technical regulations and food safety regulations” (36.69%)
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Chart 1: Knowledge about people has the right to sanction administrative violations of
food safety violations (n = 338)
About civil servants' knowledge about people who had the right to sanction administrative violations: only less than 40% of public employees knew: civil servants assigned to implement inspection (34.62%), market management (39.94%), inspection collaborators (39.94%) The most knowledgeable public servants were: chief inspectors, judge of health and public security (both reached 45.27%)
Chart 2: Assessing the status of general knowledge about food safety inspection
profession of civil servants (n = 338)
Chart 2 showed that only less than one-third of civil servants (32.54%) correctly answered over 50% of the general knowledge
Trang 62 Practice on the inspection profession of civil servants working in food safety inspection
Table 4: The type of establishment that has participated in the inspection and the
ability to perform testing samples (n = 338)
I Type of establishment that has ever participated in inspection
II Ability to perform test sampling
Reasons for not being able to perform sampling (n = 22)
2.1 Due to limited capacity, understanding of food sampling and
2.2 Limitations of equipment and essential tools using for sample
- About the practice of inspection: only 3.55% of civil servants had not been involved
in inspection Among the civil servants who had been involved in inspection, the inspection in food production establishments was the most, inspectors at least with food importers (37.42%)
- About the ability to perform testing samples: Among civil servants who had participated in the inspection, the majority of civil servants knew how to perform testing samples (93.49%) However, still 6.51% of civil servants could not get the sample due
to some reasons: the highest belongs to "Restriction of equipment and essential tools used for taking and preserving samples" (77.27%), followed by “No sampling certificate" (55.55%) and "Limited capacity, understanding of food sampling and preservation of samples" (36.36%)
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Table 5: The work/content prepared and the actual implementation in conducting an
inspection (n = 338)
I The work/content prepared to conduct the inspection
3 Preparing legal basis (decision on inspection, prepare legal bases to use) 151 46.32
6 Notifying the subject to be inspected before coming to the inspection 124 38.04
7 Meeting with the subject of inspection before going to the inspection 156 47.85
II Things done when conducting inspections at the facility
1 Announcing the inspection legal basis (inspection decision or
6 Collecting exhibits, take samples, implementing urgent solutions 124 38.04
10 Suspension of on-site inspections to perform other work After a
- On the preparation of inspection: with all contents prepared for the inspection,
public servants only knew less than 50% In particular, the lowest was: "Notifying the
subject to be inspected before coming” (38.04%)
- In particular, what was done when conducting the inspection: 87.73% and 87.42%
of the civil servants answered the following contents: "Legal basis check" and "Listening to the inspected subject presented report" However, the content
of "Collecting exhibits, taking samples, implementing solutions" had the lowest rate (38.04%)
Trang 8Chart 3: Assessing the status of general practice on food safety
inspection profession of civil servants
The results of chart 3 showed that 47.04% of the public servants correctly answered
≥ 50% of the questions about general practice
DISCUSSION
In order to ensure food safety for users,
in addition to issuing legal documents,
technical regulations; improving the capacity
of the state management system on food
safety; strengthening communication and
education for food managers, producers,
processors, suppliers, and food users, and
inspections play an extremely important
role
Since early 2009, after the Decree
79/2008/ND-CP of Government [4], a
specialized inspection system for food
safety in the health sector was established
at two levels The specialized inspection
system for food safety in the health sector
has only been established since early
2009, with forces still had not enough
and only formed at the central and
provincial/city levels In 2012, the
Government issued Decree No
07/2012/ND-CP regulating on agencies
assigned to perform specialized inspection and inspection activities, in which the Vietnam Food Administration and Branches Department of Food Hygiene and Safety implemented inspection function on food safety [5] In the context of the newly established Sub-Department of Food Hygiene and Safety, in addition to caring about the number of civil servants, the quality related to implementation capacity (knowledge, practice) of food safety inspection is also a problem that needs to
be adequately addressed
1 Knowledge about inspection profession of civil servants who carried out the food safety inspection
The first basic task of a public inspection officer was to know what the responsibility
of the inspected unit will need to do The results showed that the highest level of knowledge about the sub-category "The person with authority to work with the
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inspection/inspection team" was only
55.62%, the lowest percentage was the
sub-unit under test that needs: "Strictly
abiding by the requirements, petitions,
decisions and conclusions on inspection
and inspection (only reaching 41.12%)
About the content of specialized inspection
of food hygiene and safety, most of the
civil servants' knowledge about the contents
in this section was quite low, all of them
were below 50%, of which the lowest
was the sub-section: standards, technical
regulations and food safety regulations”
(with only 36.69%)
About those who had the right to
sanction administrative violations, only
less than 40% of public employees knew
about public servants assigned to implement
inspection (34.62%), market management
(39.94%), inspection collaborators (39.94%)
The most knowledgeable public servants
were: chief inspectors, judge of health and
public security (both reached 45.27%)
In summary, only less than one-third of
civil servants (32.64%) correctly answered
≥ 50% of general knowledge questions
This was a very important result because
if the knowledge of the inspector did not
guarantee, it could lead to the inspection,
the inspection was incorrect, insufficient
and not deep, this might create gaps,
affecting the calculation legal of food
safety inspection
2 Practice on the inspection
profession of civil servants working in
food safety inspection
As the knowledge section, there were
many contents in the practice section that
must be firmly grasped by inspection
officials The results in table 3 showed
that only 3.55% of civil servants had not been involved in inspection Among those who had been involved in the inspection, the establishment was inspected at least with the food importer (only 37.42%)
One of the important tasks and skills of civil servants doing food safety inspection was to take samples for testing The results
of table 3 showed that almost all civil servants knew how to perform testing samples (93.49%) However, 6.51% of them still cannot got the sample due to some reasons: the highest percentage belongs to "Restrictions of equipments and essential tools for taking and preserving samples" (77.27%), followed
by "No sampling certificate" (55.55%) and
"Limited capacity, understanding of food sampling and preservation" (36.36%) This was similar to the statement in the report on the quality of food hygiene and safety in 2009 of the Vietnam Food Administration [6] Through this, it could
be seen that there are still certain limitations related to equipments and basic tools for sampling (missing or not ensuring quality) In addition to this reason, civil servants themselves had recognized that they needed to have a certificate
of parallel sampling to improve their qualifications and sampling capacity to meet the job
Practical preparation and practical implementation of a food inspection was something that an inspector needs to know However, the results of table 4 showed that all contents were prepared for the inspection, the percentage of civil servants only knew less than 50% In general, only 47.04% of civil servants
Trang 10correctly answered ≥ 50 or more practical
questions This was a very low rate or in
other words, the capacity of inspection
profession was still limited This was
similar to the statement in the report of
the Vietnam Food Administration in 2010,
this inspection had many limitations
because the compliance with the
provisions of the law on inspection was
not as good as when the union refer to
the facility for food hygiene and safety
inspection but did not announce the
decision to inspect, or took food samples
but did not fully record in the inspection
minutes, sampling records [7, 8, 9]
From all above results, it was necessary
to implement measures such as regular
training to improve the knowledge and
practice on food safety inspection activities
for civil servants assigned to this task
CONCLUSION
The knowledge and practice of food
safety inspection of 30 provinces/cities
was still limited About knowledge, related
to "The content of specialized inspection
of food hygiene and safety": Most of the
civil servants' knowledge about the contents
in this section was quite low, all of them
were below 50% In addition, less than
one-third of civil servants (32.54%) correctly
answered ≥ 50% of questions about
general knowledge About practice: 3.55%
of civil servants had not participated in
inspection yet 6.51% of civil servants
could not get a sample due to some
reasons: the highest percentage belonged
to "Restrictions of equipments and essential
tools to use for taking and preserving
samples" (77.27%), "No with sampling
certificate” (55.55%) and “Limited capacity, understanding of food sampling and preservation” (36.36%) Only about 47.04% of civil servants answered correctly
≥ 50% or more practical questions
REFERENCES
1 Vietnam Food Administration Report on
food poisoning situation from 2006 to 2010 and priorities in preventing food poisoning in the coming time Ministry of Health 2011
2 Vietnam Food Administration - Vietnam Science and Technology Association for Food Safety Yearbook of the 5th Food Science and Safety Conference Hanoi Publisher 2009, pp.45-46
3 Nguyen Cong Khan Ensuring food safety
and hygiene in Vietnam - Challenges and prospects, Yearbook of the 5th Food Science and Safety Conference, Hanoi Publisher 2009, pp.11-22
4 Vietnam Government Decree No
79/2008/ND-CP dated July 18, 2008 on the system of management, inspection and testing
of food hygiene and safety 2008
5 Vietnam Government Decree No
07/2012/ND-CP dated February 9, 2012, Regulation on assigned agencies implementing specialized inspection functions and specialized inspection activities 2012
6 Vietnam Food Administration Report on
the work of ensuring food hygiene and safety
in 2009
7 Vietnam Food Administration Report on
the work of ensuring food hygiene and safety
in 2006
8 Vietnam Food Administration Report on
the work of ensuring food hygiene and safety
in 2007
9 Vietnam Food Administration Report on
the work of ensuring food hygiene and safety
in 2008