Assessment of Food Safety Knowledge, Attitude and Practice Among Restaurant Workers in Kisumu City, Kenya

Abstract

ABSTRACT Food safety is an important public health concern, because a large number of people take their meals outside the home and are exposed to food borne illnesses. Restaurant workers playa key role in prevention of occurrences of food borne illnesses besides meeting the goal of serving safe food. Kisumu, the third largest City in Kenya has an assortment of restaurants serving its diverse population. Cases of food borne illnesses have continued to be reported in the City for many years. Whereas contributing factors of unsafe food in restaurants have been documented, limited studies have been undertaken to assess food safety knowledge, attitude and practice among restaurant workers in Kisumu city. In order to address this problem, the following objectives were formulated for the study: To find out the level of food safety knowledge among restaurant workers, to establish the attitude of restaurant workers toward food safety, to ascertain the level of food safety practice among restaurant workers and to determine the interrelationships between food safety knowledge, attitude and practice among restaurant workers. The study considered restaurants which employed 15 workers or more because they were regarded as large scale food service operators. According to this criterion, 51 restaurants were identified with a population of 1,190 workers. Creative Research Systems formula was used to give a sample size of 292 workers. Proportionate random sampling technique based on the number of employees was used to select the sample for study. Self-administered questionnaires and interview schedules were used to collect data. Data was analysed using descriptive statistics namely, frequencies, means and standard deviations. Pearson's product moment correlation coefficient was used to establish relationships between the variables under study. Results arising from the study showed that restaurant workers in Kisumu city possess a high level of knowledge and positive attitude toward food safety. However, their level of food safety practice was only moderate. Knowledge of food safety exhibited statistically significant relationship between attitude toward food safety on one hand (r=0.25, p< 0.01), and food safety practice on the other (r=0.16, p<0.05), Attitude toward food safety also showed statistically significant relation towards food safety practice(r=0.30, p<O.OI). These results will aid restaurant managers and trainers in developing training plans and instructional materials as well as being reference material for those in hospitality industry that have a responsibility of ensuring safe foodservice in restaurants and other public eating places