There’s an Online Tool available for Food Safety checks. The City of Cape Town’s Environmental Health Service has received at least one thousand applications for Certificates of Acceptability (COA) this week.
Online Tool for Food Safety
According to City Officials, a COA is a legal document indicating that a food-handling establishment complies with the hygiene and food safety standards as outlined in the Regulations governing the general hygiene requirements for food premises, the transport of food and related matters, R638 of 22 June 2018.
A Certificate of Acceptability
The Mayoral Committee Member for Community Services, Councillor Patricia van der Ross says Environmental Health Practitioners (EHPs) facilitate applications for Certificates of Acceptability and that no cost is associated with these applications. She says there was a surge in applications following President Cyril Ramaphosa’s announcement last Friday that spaza shops need to be registered, amid numerous food safety incidents around the country in recent months.
Van der Ross says, that in the last week, there have been two incidents in Cape Town that have sparked widespread interest. The one was the makeshift butchery in Mfuleni and the other was the discovery of food past its sell-by date in Khayelitsha.
She says probes into the incidents are ongoing
At the same time, she has cautioned against the persistent references to ‘expired’ food. She says it’s important to note that there is NO provision for ‘expired food’ in the current South African Labelling Regulations. However, the regulations do dictate that all foodstuff have an indicated date marking on the label.
Generally, these are:
o ‘Best Before’, which generally applies to foods that do not require refrigeration (canned goods, rice, pasta, cereal, biscuits etc.)
o ‘Sell By’, which is the date by which it should leave the store, but will still be safe for a reasonable period of time after
o ‘Use By’, which is the most critical, and generally applies to meat, dairy or any other product that requires refrigeration.
Perishables and cold chain goods should not be sold past the use-by dates.
She says it’s also important to note, that concerning shelf-stable goods, i.e. items that do not require refrigeration, food items could still be safe to use, but the nutritional value may diminish after the sell-by date.
Van der Ross says members of the public who have health-related concerns or complaints about businesses can contact their local Environmental Health Office for assistance via their local clinic or the City’s Technical Operations Centre on 0860 103 089.
