Basseterre, St. Kitts, July 23, 2020 (SKNIS): The Consumer Affairs Department has worked along with the Ministry of Health in ensuring the safety and the health of the consumer within the market place, says Director of Consumer Affairs, Paul Queeley in appearing on “Working for You” on July 22, 2020.
“On a weekly basis our officers go into the field along with health inspectors and we conduct various inspections at the supermarkets to ensure that the items on the shelf are fit for human consumption. All items, which are expired or dented, they are removed from the shelves,” he said.
Mr. Queeley added that the health inspectors have the authority to remove the items from the premises and discard them.
“That is the major aspect of making sure that persons are safe when consuming items or purchasing items for consumption,” he said.
The director said that outside of this, there has not been much change in consumer behaviour in terms of spending and purchasing items during the COVID-19 Pandemic. All businesses are required to follow the COVID-19 measures that have been put in place including sanitization of hands, physical/social distancing and wearing of facemasks.
“What we saw in the beginning was that persons where purchasing a lot of items out of fear that the ships would stop coming,” he said. “We have not seen that over the past months and we do not anticipate that happening.”
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