Food and vegetable vendors at Costal Road Market have expressed fear of contracting diseases due to the unhygienic state of the market.
Most vendors who spoke to our reporter cried over a lack of a conducive environment to sell their goods and services, especially food items consumed by the population daily.
About 600 million individuals become ill every year due to consumption of contaminated food and approximately 420,00 0 of the victims die per annum, according to World Health Organization (WHO ).
The WHO disclosed that 1 in 10 individuals worldwide are sick from foodborne illness. Food bone diseases have been estimated to affect 550 million in persons and caused 230,000 deaths globally in 2010.
Foodborne diseases impede socioeconomic development by straining health care systems and harming national economies, tourism and trade.
Fatoumata Ceesay, a vendor at the market, said their biggest challenge is lack of toilets at the market, explaining that any time they want to ease themselves, they would go to compounds within the market to beg them to use their toilets, who sometimes refuse.
"The only place with toilet facilities is at the "Sandika" and they always charge us a certain amount before allowing us use them," she also said.
She pointed out that they pay taxes to Brikama Area Council daily but still cannot be provided with basic hygienic facilities. She added that environment there is also inundated with garbage that are indiscriminately dumped everywhere.
"The food we sell is exposed to a lot of hazards because the environment is not conducive enough," she further said, while calling on the Council to address the situation.
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Fatoumata Jallow, also a vendor at the market, said the market space is not big enough to accommodate all of them, forcing other vendors thus to sell on the highway.
"When it rains, the place is so dirty that customers do not want to buy our goods," she stated, noting that they have been paying taxes to the Council for years but could not even been provided a waste truck to collect garbage at the market.
Kaddijatou Ceesay, another vendor at the market, lamented the lack of water, saying even to wash their fish, they have to buy water to do so as there are no taps around.
Ebrima Secka, a resident of Costal Road, said there is no control over indiscriminate dumping around the market.
He added that both the Brikama Area Council and Food Safety and Quality Authority are not paying attention the situation.
