This study was conducted to identify the risk factors to secure food safety by evaluating vegetable sanitation management awareness and practice of Korean food restaurants in Daegu. The questionnaire survey was carried out from January 1 to March 31, 2016 by targeting a total of 380 Korean food restaurants in Daegu. The question items can be classified into general information, vegetable sanitation awareness, vegetable purchase characteristics, and safety management performance by production phase.
The study results were as follows. In terms of vegetable sanitation awareness, the possibility of vegetable-related food poisoning was estimated at 2.60/5 in average. If one looks into the possibility of vegetable-related food poisoning by business size, those of less than 100㎡ was recorded at 2.45, while those of greater than 100㎡ was at 2.81. Given this, there was a significant difference depending on business sizes (p<0.05). The safety awareness of the recently supplied vegetable was measured at 3.25/5 or at a ''average'' level. Among the 8 sanitation inspection items checked by sanitary officials, ‘cleaning and disinfection of vegetables and ‘refrigerated storage after cutting vegetables’ showed a low rate of sanitation inspection experiences. When the restaurants of less than 100㎡ were compared to the ones of greater than 100㎡, it was found that those of larger business sizes showed a higher number of sanitation inspection experiences. The average vegetable consumption period was estimated at 2.97 days. The checking of labeled information at the time of purchase (19.7%) and temperature checking (2.5%) were not practiced frequently. The number of those restaurants which used disinfectants to clean vegetables was at an extremely low level of 5.5%. The awareness about the necessity to clean vegetables was measured at a low level of 2.34/5. According to the Importance Performance Analysis (IPS) of cooking, serving and food waste treatment, the ‘focus here’ item which had a high importance level but a low practice level was ‘refrigerated storage from pretreatment to serving’, whereas those items which had a low importance level but a low practice level turned out to be 6 items including ‘separate sink use for fish/meat and vegetables’. If one compares the sanitation practice levels in cooking, serving and waste-food treatment phases by business sizes, those of larger sizes showed a higher practice level in 11 items including ‘food treatment at a height of more than 60cm from the floor’ (p<0.05). If one compares the sanitation practice levels in cooking, serving and waste-food treatment phases with or without cook certificates, those restaurants with cook certificates showed a higher practice level in 3 items including ‘food treatment at a height of more than 60cm from the floor’ (p<0.05).
Based on the above study results, restaurants, it is necessary to increase the awareness about sanitation management for the safety of food using vegetables at Korean food restaurants in Daegu and to provide education programs by production phase. In addition, it is also needed to offer an intensive on-site guidance for vegetable sanitation management as well as a continuous sanitation education with an aim of improving restaurant owners and employee’s awareness about sanitation.