Tanzanian meat consumers told to consider animal welfare

A study has unveiled the likely health risks for meat consumers in Tanzania for failure to consider the animal welfare and food safety.

This was disclosed yesterday by a representative of World Animal Protection, Dr Victor Yamo during the presentation of a report titled ‘consumers perception on animal welfare and food safety’ in Dar es Salaam.

He said meat consumers in the country are less concerned about how an animal is treated before it lands on the table for consumption.

“Throughout our survey which was conducted in Arusha and Dar es Salaam, we found that 37.2 per cent of Tanzanians do not consider meat being free from chemical contamination as important for their own well-being,” Dr Yamo said.

Moreover, Dr Yamo said 54.37 per cent of the participants did not consider how the animal is raised as a very important thing while 60.7 per cent and 56.8 per cent did not care the welfare of the animal during transportation and slaughter to be important.

“Our study also showed that 89.9 per cent of the respondents would purchase more meat only if it had food safety assurance marked from Supermarkets,” said him.

He then reminded consumers that the use of antibiotics in farm animals has led to proliferation of antimicrobial resistance which he said has serious impact on human health.

“If you treat animals well, they can bring good products for human consumption but, likewise, if you treat them poorly, they can produce products which are harmful for consumption,” he said.

He also pointed out that chicken remain the most loved meat in the country with 93 per cent of consumption while that of cow is 85 per cent.

Source: allafrica.com