The food safety knowledge of street food vendors and the sanitary conditions of their street food vending environment in the Zululand District, South Africa

This research sought to evaluate the food safety knowledge of street food vendors and the sanitary compliance status of their vending facilities, Zululand District, South Africa. Data collection was done in a face to face interview with respondents in a cross-sectional survey research design. Data was collected from 399 randomly selected street food vendors and 200 randomly selected street food vending facilities. Only a minority of the street food vendors had attended high school (47 %) and the vast majority (77 %) of them had not attended any food safety training courses. Overall, the vast majority (76 %) of the street food vendors had low food safety knowledge and only 14 % of the street food vending sites had high compliance with sanitary conditions. In conclusion, this study demonstrates that most of vending facilities of street food vendors constitute a food safety risk to the consumers. This was primarily due to the possession of inadequate food safety knowledge of street food vendors, non-compliant street food vending infrastructure, and inadequate monitoring and controls by competent authorities. It is recommended that, authorities should implement the food stalls/caravan system in areas with adequate sanitation and use the licensing and permit tool to ensure control and adherence to food safety regulations and street food vendors and health inspectors should be trained on safe food handling principles and practice.