View report page

SECTION D
INSPECTION AND SUPERVISION OF FOOD
The promotion of improved standards of food hygiene continues to engage the
attention of the department. In addition to discussions on the subject in shops,
factories, etc., addresses have been given at meetings of local trade and other
organisations.
Improvements have been made in many directions but without doubt one of the
greatest problems lies in the retail market areas where street trading is permitted.
Without discussing, in a general sense, the merits or demerits of street
trading the sale of food from stalls in the open air is extremely undesirable,
particularly so in street markets which are invariably dusty and untidy places as
the result of the processes carried on by stall holders, such as the sifting of
potatoes, trimming of greenstuffs, and the gutting of fish, together with the
practice of depositing refuse in the roadway.
Many of the stalls occupied by street traders are hired and are generally of
the most primitive type. Even in those cases where canvas screens are fitted the
temptation to raise them for the purpose of display frequently proves irresistible.
Competition with the stallholder induces adjacent shopkeepers to extend the
display of foods by opening shopfronts, a procedure which is followed by proffering
35