A STUDY OF FOOD HYGIENE PRACTICES AMONG INFORMAL AND FORMAL FOOD VENDORS IN PORT HARCOURT

This study investigates the knowledge, attitude and practice of food hygiene among food handlers in Port Harcourt Local Government Area of Rivers State. A descriptive survey design was adopted as the research design for this study. The study population comprised of all the food handlers in Port Harcourt Local Government Area of Rivers State. A multistage sampling technique was adopted to select 400 respondents for the study. The instrument for data collection was structured questionnaire with a reliability coefficient of 0.76. Data collected was analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 20.0 . Statistical tools such as frequency and percentage were used for relevant variables. The result showed that (63.5%) were within the age range of 21-30 years, more than half (56.0%) had secondary education, and more than half (53.8%) were cooks. The type of food establishments operated include restaurant (32.0%), fast food/snacks bar (22.3%), hotel (15.8%), canteen (11.5%) , bakery (11.3%), and mobile food services (7.3%). The findings of this study showed that 80.5% of the respo ndents had good knowledge of food hygiene. The grand mean for attitude was = 3.16 which is greater than the criterion mean = 2.5 indicating that respondents had a positive attitude towards food hygiene. The most frequent food hygiene practice was proper disposal of waste which 64.0% do always; 60.7% always trim and clean their finger nails. It was concluded that knowledge, attitude and practice of food hygiene among food handlers was good. Though knowledg e of food hygiene was good, a small proportion still lack food hygiene knowledge hence, it was recommended that, food hygienists and environmental health professionals should make concerted effort to promote or increase awareness of food hygiene through enforcement of public health laws, mass media and social media.