An early morning sweep of some Mackenzie, Linden supermarkets and retail outlets last week resulted in a quantity of damaged and expired goods being seized.

The raid was carried out by the Linden Town Council’s Department of Environmental Health and the National Food and Drug Department. The seized items included biscuits, ground coffee, toothpaste, boxes of cubes, Jello, frosted flakes, evaporated milk, Green Power juices, Tampico tropical punch, Flora butter, I Can’t Believe its Not Butter and containers of guava cheese.

According to M&TC Environmental Health Officer Marilyn Braithwaite the activity is a routine exercise to ensure customers’ rights are maintained and at the same time promote safe health practices. She said that not all the items were expired, some were damaged bearing broken seals, or like the cubes, had melted because of improper storage. Braithwaite said too persons believe that most products have at least three months’ shelf life after the expiration date.

“We want customers to understand that an expiration date means that the product is no longer fit for consumption or other use. Persons should not purchase products that have been expired at no time and once we find any store or shop with dates beyond that on the label we will seize it,” Braithwaite said. Most of the expired items pulled from the shelves had expired between August and November. According to Braithwaite many of the business managers explained that retailers had mixed the expired goods with others that had longer expiration dates.

Braithwaite also said that some floor managers were at fault for not practising the first-in, first-out system. “In other cases it was laziness on the part of some floor managers who do not practice good housekeeping,” she contended.

She then advised customers to be very careful when shopping especially close to and during the Christmas season as this is when most expired and damaged goods are deliberately put on the shelves.
The M&TC conducted a similar exercise last year.