The State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection reported on inspections during the year - revealed violations in 40% of cases

Submitted by bashun on Tue, 04/24/2018 - 13:03

In 2017 the service carried out inspections of 4873 business entities, discovering violations in 1984 of them, according to UNIAN.

The State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection in 2017 carried out inspections of 4,873 business entities, discovering violations in 1984 of them, that is, in 40% of cases.

This was stated during a forum on consumer protection issues by Oleh Kobelkov, the head of the Department of State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection. According to him, the most violations were recorded in Sumy (97% of inspections), Rivne (92%) and Chernivtsi (80%) regions, while in Kyiv this figure was 9%. As for the violations themselves, the most common is the lack of necessary, accessible, reliable and timely information on products - 74.8% of cases. Another 17.2% of violations - the sale of goods with expired shelf life. Other common violations include denial to the consumer of exercising his legal rights, manufacturing and selling products that do not comply with legal norms, selling prohibited products, and violating the terms of the contract between the consumer and the service provider.

Kobelkov added that last year the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection checked goods and services worth 55.17 million UAH, preventing the acquisition and use of low-quality goods, works and services for the amount of 8.97 million UAH. According to him, one of the main obstacles in the work of the service is imperfect legislation. "The problem of all legislation on the protection of consumer rights, in particular, lies in the imperfection of control. There is no normal legal basis for implementing the norms of legislation," he said. As an example, Kobelkov cited the law on consumer protection, according to which the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection employees can check the labeling of food products, but the rules for checking food products do not say a word about this body. "How can we test the labeling of food products, if we do not have the right to check food at all?", he noted.

As UNIAN reported, in early April of this year the law came into force, by which a new system of quality control and safety of food, feed and by-products of animal origin is introduced. The law provides for inspection by inspectors of enterprises without warning in advance, except for the audit of the HACCP system. Audit of permanent procedures based on the principles of HACCP is conducted subject to notification of the market operator not later than three working days before the implementation of such an event. Inspections will become risk-oriented, and their frequency will be sufficient to achieve the objectives of this law - improving the safety of products. Thus, according to the law, enterprises will be checked depending on the degree of risk to life and health of people. The law stipulates that the inspectors of the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection should carry out inspections in accordance with the verification act. This document should contain exhaustive information on the number of questions to be checked, and should be public. Video surveillance of inspectors of control measures is allowed without the consent of business entities. At the same time, business entities has also the right to make video fixation. Such a rule allows the process of inspections to be transparent.

English

Read more