What changed between 2008–2020 about Employees' perception of hygiene in the catering industry in Ankara (Turkey)?

Food safety is a public health concern because foodborne diseases have been increasing in recent years due to several factors such as urbanization, globalization and changes in consumer habits. Many countries in the world, including Turkey have upgraded their laws about food and personnel hygiene in the catering industry and undertaken changes to the organizational structure of their regulatory institutions to protect consumers' health. In this study, it was aimed to evaluate the perceptions of food processors on food safety and to determine whether there has been a change in this matter over the last 12 years. The data has been collected by conducting face to face interviews and having 500 employees from the sector fill in a questionnaire constructed for this purpose. The responses to the questionnaire have been measured by assigning ‘hygiene perception points’ to each respondent according to their replies. These hygiene perception points have been analysed in terms of gender, age, educational level and work experience of the employees involved. The results have revealed that employees between the ages of 26–34, women, university graduates have a higher level of perception of hygiene than other age groups, men, those with lower education levels, respectively. Hygiene perception points were found to be higher compared to the results obtained 12 years ago. The positive changes observed in the hygiene perception points are thought to result from the differences in the legislation of the years in which both studies were conducted. It is thought that the obligatory of providing hygiene and food safety training to individuals working in the catering sector with law changes leads to positive changes in the employees. Legally compulsory training activities can overcome many sanitation and safety problems that result from misinformed or uninformed employees.