KUCHING: Grade C coffeeshop, eating outlets and food premises will be phased out in Padawan Municipal Council (MPP) areas.
Currently, there are 550 coffeeshops and eating outlets located within the area. Of these, 170 have been categorised as Grade ‘A’, 374 as Grade ‘B’ and six categorised under Grade ‘C’. Those under Grade ‘C’ have been warned to improve within one month.
“We have six under Grade C now, by next month they will be gone,” said MPP Chairman, Ir. Lo Khere Chiang to reporters after inspecting coffeeshops, eating outlets and food premises at Kota Sentosa here yesterday.
He stressed that MPP has its Key Performance Index (KPI).
“When I first started working with the Council, we got Grade A, B, C and D. But today we have already improved and now we only have Grade ‘A’ and ‘B’, and Grade ‘C’ is now given warning already.
“Everybody wants a conducive environment to eat and drink. Nobody wants to eat in a dirty environment. “Today, we seldom hear people go to coffeeshops and come back with stomachache and need to go to hospital because of food poisoning.
“So, I am very happy that over the years we have developed and ensured the cleanliness of our coffeeshops, food premises, hawker centres and our markets, and we have managed to ensure that we keep cleanliness as our priority.
“I encourage the public to continue to be our eyes and ears to keep eating outlets in MPP areas in tip-top condition,” he said, adding that it was important when it comes to tourism as tourists would first take note of the cleanliness of the food outlets, toilets, tables and chairs.
According to Francis Liu, MPP’s Environmental Health assistant officer and Acting Head of the Health Division, in 2017, one food outlet was ordered to be closed and in 2016, two were ordered to be closed. He revealed that the closing order was issued by the Health Department under Section 11 of the Food Act 1983.
