Sales Environment and Hygienic Practices of Street Food in N'Djamena, Chad

The preparation and sale of street food is a sociocultural and economic fact in all countries of the world. For more than a decade, this activity has a remarkable growth given the rampant urbanization of African cities in general and N'Djamena, the capital of Chad in particular, the development of the middle class and the development of work both formally and informally. However, the hygienic failures observed around this activity constitute a source of contamination of these foods. The objective of this work is to evaluate sales environment and hygienic practices of Street Food in N'Djamena, Chad. The study was conducted from October 2013 to January 2018 in N'Djamena, Chad. Thus 809 sellers and 455 consumers were surveyed in the public squares of N'Djamena. The results showed a strong presence of women with a proportion of 63.04%. Our study showed that 66.63% of vendors sold in an unclean environment, 61.81% kept their food in pots placed on the floor and 100% of the same vendors did not wear gloves or bucco-nasal masks. The surveyed vendors (92.58%) received no training in hygiene and food technology. The majority (90.99%) of consumers ate their foods with bare hands and 93.33% said they found undesirable elements in foods. Only 23.08% of consumers said there is no risk of food transmitting disease Improving the environmental conditions of the preparation areas and the sales site will prevent foodborne diseases. The competent authorities are called upon to train these sellers but also to implement clear texts with regular monitoring and follow-up plans to improve the hygienic conditions of the latter.