(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) During the first half of this year, Dubai Municipality has ordered temporary closure of 94 food outlets due to hygiene violations.
"These food establishments were given a short period of time to modify their status and clear all the violations related to hygiene and unhealthy practices, expired foodstuffs, and the presence of spoiled foods," said Sultan Al Taher, Head of Food Inspection Section in the Food Safety Department at Dubai Municipality.
"At the same time, 1,409 food establishments in Dubai received Excellent and Gold rating during the first half of 2017," he pointed out.
"Al Tahir explained that during this period, the inspectors of the department carried out 15,681 inspection visits, including visits to confirm the 1,733 communications received by the Municipality Call Centre at a rate of nine communications a day.
"We receive several communications from consumers, but they must be confirmed before deciding whether or not to issue fines," he said.
"The visits showed that 997 communications were incorrect and 954 communications (55% of the total communications) were correct and they were dealt with immediately. Some food outlets took corrective measures before the inspector arrived to ascertain the facts about the complaint. Some customers had threatened them to complain to the municipality," Al Tahir added.
He reiterated that the municipality follows up, with concern, the reports and observations received from public through the Call Centre, and conduct checks on food establishments, including warehouses and restaurants, to take the necessary corrective measures as per the Local Order No. 11 of 2003.
Al Tahir pointed out that the 94 food establishments were closed due to several violations; the most important of them were related to hygiene issues and the Municipality inspectors directed them to take immediate corrective action.
The Municipality closed these establishments for up to three hours to modify their status and clean the premises before getting the right evaluation.
He said that some of the closures were due to the presence of insects in the outlets, which should be informed to the company contracted to clean up, and thus lift the violation.
Al Tahir added that the inspectors of the Municipality noticed violations related to sanitation, requiring direct closure, and prevent the restaurant from doing work until modifying its status. "Some irregularities included non-compliance of the establishment with the commercial activity approved in the license," he said.
Al Tahir pointed out that all the closures carried out by the inspectors of the Food Safety Department during this period were of high risk establishments.
"We do not close less dangerous outlets because they do not commit many violations that directly affect consumers, but their violations are related to administration, which are required to be corrected during the time the inspector visits," he said.
"Out of the 1,409 food outlets that were awarded Excellent and Gold rating during the evaluation, 774 have received the Gold rating and 2,455 received Very Good. There were 1,991 establishments that received Good rating" pointed out Al Tahir.
He added that 585 establishments received Acceptable rating during the first half of this year and 82 were evaluated Weak, noting that the number of outlets that received the rating of Acceptable and Weak has become less compared with previous years, whereas those who get Excellent and Gold have increased.
Al Tahir said that violations in the summer increase because of high temperatures, as the heat directly affects the food and damage it faster and poor storage and ventilation add to it.
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