What is happening to the ice-cream?

At the beginning of this week the mass-media headlines said that on the street of all Bulgarian cities a polluted ice-cream is being sold. The Consumer Protection Federation alarmed the "customers" by its chief secretary Mr. Peter Karlev. He emphasized several facts:

  • The street merchants sell their ice-cream at a lower price – this alone does not mean anything. If they could undercut the price and still make profit let them do it. Every merchant and producer must have certain degree of freedom to define the selling price in such way as to have profit and to cover his costs and at the same time the price should not be too high so he could lose his customers.
  • The street merchants pour out the ice-cream in the machines from dirty buckets – how do you prove such a claim, does it apply to all ice-cream makers and is it possible that the merchants in shops are doing the same? It is not possible to have a definite answer.
  • The ice-cream in the machines in question is cooled with the aid of polluted air – oh no! It is very different from the one we breathe in the cities?!
  • In all member state of the EU the sale of unpacked food on the open is strictly forbidden – does this mean that unpacked foods are not sold on the open. Each one of us who had traveled outside Bulgaria had seen the same picture as at our bitches and resorts. May be to a lesser degree, but everywhere there are people who offer water melons, corn, creams in a cone. Naturally, all these fall into the forbidden territory in the EU. Apparently for now the situation could not be controlled to a sufficient degree even in the developed European countries, what to say about Bulgaria. The ban is still applying (from January 1st 2007 all producers in our country must apply the European system for control of food safety).
  • The Inspection for safety and control of the public health is not doing its job and is not imposing the necessary sanctions – apparently this is the problem. If there was a body which is actually controlling and is sanctioning the troublemakers there would have not been the need to think now whether or not to buy ice-cream for a machine on the street. It is too much.

What is happening now?

  • 1) Ban – there is one
  • 2) Merchants with unpacked foods in the open – also
  • 3) These merchants do not pay taxes
  • 4) They are not registered and are outside of any control
  • 5) They do not fall in any official statistics
  • 6) They could not be sanctioned
  • 7) A body which is actually controlling – there is none
  • 8) A body which must control the situation – there is one
  • 9) Salaries for its employees – there are

10) The ban is not observed

May be the solution is not coming up and introducing all sorts of bans.

May be it is an absurd the consumers to be warned about someone who is not doing his job and how someone is not being controlled.

At least we are informed. 

 


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