Poor cleaning and maintenance led to 54 independent grocery stores having to make improvements after the Norwegian Food Safety Authority’s inspections last year.
In 2018, 88 independent grocery stores were inspected in Buskerud, Vestfold, Telemark, Hedmark and Oppland. A stand-alone grocery store is a business that is not affiliated with a chain.
In three of the stores, the conditions was so severe that the owner was ordered to close all or part of the store until they corrected the conditions.
Poor cleaning and maintenance of the store’s premises were the reasons why the Norwegian Food Safety Authority instructed the owners to close.
“It is worrying when pests can enter the premises where food is stored and to be sold. The pests, especially mice and rats, can bring with them infectious agents that can make food harmful to health,” says Senior Adviser Ågot Li in the Norwegian Food Safety Authority.
Prohibition on the sale of food was also given to three other stores, without them being ordered to close at inspection.
In 30 of the 88 grocery stores they had less serious breaches of the regulations.
© #Norway Today
