Mark Titus, Enterprise Reporter

Left: Williams: The consumer has a duty to demand quality. Center: Fulton: We cannot continue ... slaughtering animals under trees. Right: Little-White ... says policy would force industry to adopt global standards - File photos

Noted food and nutrition consultant, Dr Heather Little-White, is calling on Government to implement a national food and nutrition policy to address the unsanitary manner in which meat is being prepared at slaughterhouses.

"There needs to be a national food and nutrition policy which would address all the areas of food production and preparation as one policy," she tells The Gleaner. "With this in place, the issues of sanitation and hygiene would be taken care of: sanitation, in terms of environment and surroundings, hygiene, in terms of the individuals who prepare food."

"The public health department does it, but it is only done in bits and pieces," she noted. "A food and nutrition policy would drive that kind of standard that would see the important aspects of sanitation being taken care of.

"No matter how we produce food and it is not sanitary in terms of our environment, then we will still have a problem," the nutrition guru argues.

Little-White argued that such a policy would also result in the monitoring of food-safety standards being "placed under one umbrella", contrary to the present situation which sees the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Agriculture's Veterinary Services Division sharing responsibility.

Healthy foods

"We need the system so that we can have healthy foods and First-World standards," says executive director of the Jamaica 4-H Clubs, Lenworth Fulton. "This needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency.

"With all the diseases such as the bird flu and mad cow disease, we cannot continue the old way of slaughtering animals under trees or in people's backyards. We need to see abattoirs of international standards being built."

If that policy is to materialise, Annabel Williamson, president of the Jamaica Pig Farmers Association, believes that it has to be industry-driven.

"The Bureau of Standards is keen to assist, but they cannot do it alone. So it is a question of getting processes, farmers and traders together for this to become a reality." She tells The Gleaner, "A lot of the meat that comes in our supermarkets is in generic form; you don't know where it has been slaughtered, or who is (rearing) it, you don't know anything.

"The consumer has a duty to demand quality," she says. "When you buy a piece of meat in a supermarket, you want to see the respective information, so that you can properly identify the origin of the products."

She further states that the consuming public must use its purchasing power to demand quality packaging and processing standards.

"Consumers must become aware of the health, nutrition and food quality standards. If it's not properly presented, with all the relevant information, don't buy it," Williams noted.

mark.titus@gleanerjm.com