Food Safety is Important to Improve Health and Well-being
NTPC IS THE NATIONAL TRAINING PROVIDER FOR FOOD SAFETY-RELATED COURSES
Vicky Vinesh Narayan
The World Food Safety Day was set aside by the United Nations in 2018 to raise awareness of food safety. Safe food is an integral component to ensure food security and food availability, and it is equally important to create care and implement actions to prevent, detect and manage foodborne risks and improve human health.
Food safety is essential for improving population health and well-being as it contributes to addressing communicable and noncommunicable diseases. The World Food Safety Day is an annual event held on the 7th of June, and Fiji National University’s (FNU) National Training and Productivity Centre (NTPC) hosted a webinar to mark this event. The theme for this year was “Safer food, better health” to ensure a healthier population.
To complement the efforts of the United Nations and the World Health Organizations, the National Training and Productivity Center has developed multiple programmes and initiatives to ensure food safety practices in the food and manufacturing sector. This includes, but is not limited to, short courses, consultancy services and a review of food safety policies for small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
The Department of National Productivity and Industry Innovation of the NTPC, provides training and consultancy services for Food Safety Management System and to commemorate the World Food Safety Day, the department organized a free webinar and invited guest speakers from various interested parties to talk on various topics. The event was attended by many industry representatives who actively engaged during the interactive Q&A session.
The speakers presented on the following topics; Dr Subhash Yadav, Medical Officer and Team Lead, Communicable Diseases at World Health Organization spoke on “Global Theme: Safer Food, Better Health”; Ms Daventi Naidu, Group Quality Assurance Manager at FMF Foods Limited spoke on “The importance of food safety certification programs in the food business”; Mr Joel Abraham, Chief Executive Officer at Fijian Competition and Consumer Commission spoke on “The role of policymakers and consumers in ensuring food safety”; Mr Vimal Deo, Chief Health Inspector at Ministry of Health, and Medical Services presented on “Overview of food safety policies in ensuring food safety in Fiji”; while Ms Leona Waqaivolavola, Instructor, at NTPC, presented on the training courses in the area of food safety management offered at the training centre.
The topics encouraged participants to actively get involved in designing and implementing their food safety management.
Each speaker represented the relevant sector of the food safety management system with the NTPC being a key component of such system.
NTPC is the national training provider for food safety-related courses. NTPC has trained over 1000+ food safety professionals and assisted multiple organizations in developing their food safety management systems based on international standards.
Currently, the Department of National Productivity and Industry Innovation is actively involved in providing consultancy services for reviewing food safety policies, designing standard operating procedures and assisting in auditing the food safety system. Additionally, the Department has a strong hold on the following domains:
The need for food safety awareness has never been greater as the number of cases of food adulteration and fraudulent food practices increases. The Fiji Food Safety Act 2003, Food Safety Regulations 2009, and the Food Establishment (Grading) Regulations 2012 are the three core national legislation that govern and ensure safe food practices.
The Food Handlers training course is an essential for all food handlers in the country.
Whether they are in the manufacturing industry, tourism sector, agriculture, restaurants or roadside vendors, the Food Handlers training course is suitable for all.
This course is approved by the Ministry of Health and Medical Service thus, it is a vital programme to educate food safety professionals on food safety.
The National Training and Productivity Centre (NTPC) is mandated to facilitate reskilling and upskilling of the Fijian industries to meet the current development and industry-related immediate needs.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are of the author and Do not In Any wAy rEflECt or rEprEsent the position of the Fiji National University. com.fj
selita.bolanavanua@fijisun.