Assessment of Food Safety Practices among Smoked Fish Sellers in Ekiti State, Nigeria

Abstract

This study was carried out to assess the food safety practices among the smoked fish sellers in Ekiti State, Nigeria. It aimed at describing the socio-economic characteristics of the smoked fish sellers; identifying the food safety practices, examining the determinants of using food safety practices, estimating the profitability of smoked fish and ascertaining the constraints to food safety practices among smoked fish sellers in the study area. Data, obtained through a multi-stage sampling technique, were analysed through the use of descriptive statistics and Tobit regression models. Result from socio-economic characteristics of the respondents revealed that smoked fish business was dominated by females (75.8%) who were majorly young people with the mean age of 45.5years. The majority of the respondents were married (59.1%). It was also revealed that most of the respondents were literate with different levels of education with the average family size of 6 persons. The respondents were fairly experienced with 41.7% of them had more than 10 years of involvement in smoked fish enterprise. Most of the respondents used charcoal (53.4%) and half drum kiln (57.5%) in smoking their fish. A larger percentage (33.3%) of the respondents sourced their capital from other sources. Majority (61.7%) of the respondents smoked other species of fish such as hake fish and herring fish etc. The smoked fish sellers (68.3%) had prior knowledge of food safety practices while the respondents (57.5%) had access to useful food safety practices. The majority (73.3%) of the respondents had no access to bank loans. This study revealed that the majority of the smoked fish sellers were food safety compliant. It revealed that the major food safety practices used by the respondents were sweeping of their workspace before and after processing (99.2%) and washing of their hands before and after processing (97.5%) The only place they were lacking was in the covering of their smoked fish, the study revealed only few (32.5%) of the smoked fish sellers covers their smoked fish. On the cost and returns, the study revealed the mean value of total cost to be ₦305,690 and the mean amount of the total income generated by the respondents to be ₦495,850. The total income was greater than the total cost, which implies that the business was profitable. The results of Tobit regression model analysis revealed that age, level of education, family size and access to useful food safety practices were found to significantly influence the number of food safety practices used by the respondents in the study area. On the constraints to the use of food safety practices, the study revealed that the respondents were facing different problems and the most prominent problem was the lack of storage facilities (88.3%).