Abstract:
Food borne disease remains a major public Health problem across the globe. The high incidence of food borne illness has led to an increase in global concern about food safety. The purpose of this was to assess food safety, knowledge and practices among food handlers in restaurants in Nnewi Urban. The researcher utilized a cross sectional descriptive survey design and a convenient sampling method was used to reach one hundred and eighty (180) food handlers from two randomly selected towns in Nnewi Urban. A validated questionnaire and checklist constructed by the researcher were used to collect data. Information obtained from the questionnaire and checklists were subjected to descriptive statistics and chi-square test of association at 0.05 level of significance. Analysis of data was done with the SPSS version 20.0. Findings revealed that majority (77.9%) of respondents had good knowledge of food safety. Above average (58.6%) were observed to have good food safety practices. There was no relationship between age of respondents and knowledge of food safety (p = .693). There was no relationship between educational level and food safety practices (p =.404).Length of service of respondents was significantly related to their practice of food safety (p = .015).Based on these findings, it was recommended that Health and Environmental Authorities should improve on the implementation of existing food hygiene laws. Nurses, Public health officers and Health educators; should intensify efforts to correct poor food safety practices. The government and related health agencies should provide the necessary logistics to ensure that all restaurants / food handlers are registered especiallyin rural areas.
