Guidelines for Workers Who Handle Food During the Pandemic – Ministry of Agriculture Provides Instructions

The Veterinarian Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management of Serbia has published instructions for the handling of food during the coronavirus pandemic. As said, based on what has been learned so far and an assessment of risk regarding the outbreak and the spreading of the diseases caused by COVID-19, there are no proofs indicating that the virus spreads through food, as the spreading requires a host (a human being or an animal). Still, all workers who handle food need to meet the health requirements, displaying no signs of respiratory or any other diseases that could contaminate the food.

In order to remove even the slightest possibility of having infected persons producing or handling food, transferring the virus by coughing or sneezing, or by contact, it is extremely important to comply with the following hygienic rules:

– Adequate hand washing with hot water and mandatory disinfection of hands: before work, after coughing, sneezing or wiping one's nose, before handling boiled or otherwise prepared food, after handling or preparing raw food, after handling the waste following the cleaning of the equipment and the rooms, after using the toilet, after eating, drinking or smoking, after handling money;

– Using adequate clothes and equipment while producing and handling food: protective clothes (overcoats, aprons), clean footwear, gloves, masks and caps; changing the working clothes between the production processes (handling raw and prepared food) is mandatory;

– Regular cleaning and disinfection of cookware, equipment and working surfaces, as well as all rooms;

– Providing adequate ventilation in all working rooms, preventing the spreading of the virus;

– Heating/cooking food wherever the technological processes allow for it;

– Avoiding contact contamination between cooked and uncooked food – cleaning and disinfection of equipment and working surfaces between the technological procedures.

It is also important for the subject involved in any operations involving food to comply with the following production rules:

– The ingredients must come from healthy animals;

– The food must meet all the microbiological criteria regarding food safety and hygiene;

– Water of drinking-water quality must be used in preparing food;

– Raw and prepared food must be kept at proscribed cooling and/or freezing temperatures;

– Replacement of certain ingredients in the product and/or changing of the packaging and the production process itself, if the current situation requires it.

Depending on the type of product/production process and analysis of potential hazards and risk assessment, other necessary measures can be taken, the document says.

PDF file (in Serbian) available HERE.

Uprava za veterinu Republika Srbija

Ministarstvo poljoprivrede, šumarstva i vodoprivrede Republike Srbije

coronavirus

covid 19

food

handling food

washing hands

disinfection of hands

protective working clothes

gloves

masks

caps