Hajj Hassan: Only 3% of Lebanon’s food is spoiled

Economy Minister Nicolas Nahhas said on Wednesday that there is a need for an integrated and strong organization and a censorship system to prevent the repetition of the food safety scandal.

During a joint meeting with Agriculture Minister Hussein Hajj Hassan, Nahhas added that the meeting is a follow-up on the meeting held with PM Najib Mikati in the Grand Serail and another held in the Tourism Ministry. “The meeting held in the Agriculture Ministry was a real business meeting to look into all needed measures to devise a food safety system”, Nahhas said.

The economy minister stressed that in order to follow-up on food safety, the government had to devise 30 key initiatives ranging from draft laws and draft decrees to implementation mechanisms and a plan to survey companies. Nahhas said that both economy and agriculture ministries are concerned with the issue of food safety.

For his part, Hajj Hassan addressed the Lebanese saying that the issue of food safety was not raised in the last month; rather it has been up for discussion in the past two and a half years. Hajj Hassan voiced hope that the media will set things straight without blowing the issue out of proportion. “I call on the media to reveal that the spoiled food that has been discovered only represents 3% of the food in Lebanon”, Hajj Hassan said.