Restaurant shuttered; 22,000 food items seized

The Jeddah Municipality closed down a well-known restaurant for poor hygiene. It also confiscated questionable products, which the restaurant was serving to customers.
There were a number of health violations inside the restaurant, including the presence of cockroaches, insects and poor public hygiene. The municipality investigators also discovered that six out of 10 workers were in violation of labor and residency laws. The restaurant’s license also had expired and its name was different from the name registered with the municipality.
Through its field work on the beachfront, the Jeddah Municipality confiscated 23 trolleys, four stalls and detained four tea vendors.
Municipality Head Abdullah Hussien Al-Jahni said that these campaigns, carried out on a daily basis, are waged to protect the consumer and the artistic and cultural character of the Corniche.
Al-Jahni appealed to citizens to be more cooperative and report any violations by calling 940.
In a related development, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry recently destroyed more than 22,000 food items that were expired and inadequately stored.
The items were seized upon inspection of storage refrigerators in stores run by expatriates in southern Jeddah.
The owners of the stores have been referred to investigation since this was a case of commercial fraud and the food items represented a health hazard to consumers.
The move came as a result of visits made by the ministry’s inspection teams to wholesale stores in south Jeddah. Many items were found to be stored at high temperatures, affecting the freshness and quality of the food. The food items included dairy products, dates, cooking oil, beverages and other foodstuffs.
The ministry said it will continue to inspect food stores and commercial and industrial entities to eliminate the dangers of fraudulent practices.
Moreover, it will penalize violators by announcing their names, among other measures, it added.
The ministry has called upon citizens to report violators on the toll free number 8001241616.