Food security scare!

Erica Virtue, Senior Gleaner Writer

A 2008 audit of the state inspection of meats and vegetable imports into Jamaica had raised serious concerns about the health risks to Jamaicans.

Three facilities were audited in the 2008 visit and all received failing grades, with one ordered closed immediately.

Among the findings was evidence suggesting "inadequacies of the infrastructure at the ports of entry, consignments of meats, vegetables and fruits, and the by-products of these have been entering the country for distribution to the public with execrable standards, because proper inspection, evaluation and verification cannot be properly executed."

The audit team found that some of the container stripping stations at Port Bustamante varied in "capabilities from downright unsanitary and inadequate, to minimally adequate".

Monitoring of quantities

The audit team also raised concerns that the monitoring of quantities was not consistent with permits/licences issued for imports, and go without verification or reconciliation.

It was also noted that the "switching and adulteration of consignments frustrated and or circumvented the permit or licensing regime" and which was deemed to have been facilitated by the dilapidated infrastructure.

"The sum effect of this is the exposure of the population to health and disease risk; the threat to national agriculture and food security and exposure of the country to odium, and contempt in the sphere of custom regulations and tariff commitments in our regional and international trade protocols," read the findings.

Evaluations

A ministry of health source told The Gleaner that while the entities evaluated ranged from satisfactory to very good, there are still concerns that refrigerated containers were strewn on some sites, with piles of garbage and stray animals in close proximity to them.

In the meantime, Omer Thomas, the former head of the Bureau of Standards Jamaica, and then special adviser to the Minister of Agriculture, led a team of six members, which ordered the immediate closure of one facility.

The site had nine cold rooms, but drainage was described as "extremely poor". Stagnant water was also observed.

"No inspection tables were present; the bay area for receivals was insufficient; no tables, desk or cabinet for the regulators, heavy infestation of pigeons and pigeon droppings were observed. Heavy infestation of rats, rat holes were observed," the findings read.

A cold storage packing area, which processed pigtails, was described as "congested".

Following the findings, the facility was closed temporarily and later reopened.

Thomas, in a recent interview, told The Gleaner that a ministry paper was developed as a result of the findings.

"The ministry paper became the operating manual for the ministry and the agencies, whose officials were part of the team," Thomas said.

A site visit by a Gleaner team recently showed that facility is now secured by concrete fence. Barbed wire sits atop the more-than-six-foot high fence. Previously, a broken down wire fence secured the premises.

This facility was among three, which was found to have no examination tables, and facilities for the eight state regulators who must examine containers.

The audit had also found that that temperature gauges on containers were not calibrated by the Bureau of Standards Jamaica. Some gauges now bear the seal of the bureau.