Evaluation of nutritive value and microbial quality in selected street foods and the socioeconomic status of vendors and consumers

Abstract

Street foods are very much popular because of tastes and varieties of foods, easily accessible, cost effect and appetizing. The present study aim was to assess the socio-economic status of the street food vendors and consumers, nutritive value and microbial status in selective street foods. This was conducted at 9 places in Chattogram Metropolitan City (CMC) for period of January, 2019 to June, 2020 among 40 vendors and 40 consumers and laboratory analyses were performed at “Research Laboratory” under the department of Physiology, Biochemistry and Pharmacology, Chattogram Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, Chattogram, Bangladesh. Among the vendors, 90% were male and 10% were female. Of them, 37.5% had a primary school qualification whereas 32.5% was illiterate. Almost 55% of the vendors earned 6000 to 10000 BDT per month. We recorded 53 types of street foods in CMC with a price ranged between Tk. 2 (Piaju/piece) to Tk. 30 (Briani/plate). The most preferred street foods by consumers are roll (35%), beguni (25%), piaju (22.5%), singara (22.5%), samosa (22.5%), alu chop (20%), and fuchka (15%). Almost 70% of the studied consumers consume street food every day. Hundred percent vendors had no training on food hygiene. Furthermore, 3 types of foods (singara, samosa, roll) from street and frozen were collected and analyzed. Street roll, samosa and singara, sequentially, contained higher amount of crude protein (10.85%), crude fat (27.20%) and ash content (2.80%) whereas, frozen singara, samosa and roll, respectively, contained higher amount of crude protein (10.70%), crude fat (26.61%) and ash content (2.69%). Higher amount of phosphorus content (70 mg/100g) was found in street samosa and higher amount of potassium content (689 mg/100g) was found in frozen roll. Vit-E content (7.60 mg/100g) was found higher in street singara while carotene content (10.42 mg/100g) was found higher in frozen singara. 50% of both street and frozen food samples contained Escherichia coli and nearly 34% street foods and 39% frozen foods found positive with Salmonella spp. In summary street food business offers a unique opportunity to street vendors and low-income people for their livelihood. In order to maintain the benefits of street business need to develop a hygiene policy.