A total of 72 food safety complaints, of which 12 for organoleptic changes in milk and processed meat products, 10 with claims for the presence of contaminants, 10 for suspected product safety and eight for suspected food poisoning, have been submitted to Food and Veterinary Agency in the first six months of the year.

However, the data of the Institute of Public Health available to AUV show that so far only one case of food poisoning has been recorded, recently at the "Crombert" factory in Bitola.

As the director of the AUV, Nikolce Babovski, says for the Information Agency of Macedonia, intensified and exceptional inspection controls continue, especially in tourist centers, because the summer season is operating at full capacity.

"The purpose of the enhanced controls is to prevent possible food poisoning and infections that can easily occur as a result of high temperatures.

Controls cover all tourist centers, including mountain ones.

Veterinarians and official inspectors supervise hotels, restaurants, pizzerias, patisseries, breweries, bakeries, markets and other food operators, where there is an increased frequency of tourists during this period of time", emphasizes Babovski.

Strong controls, the director adds, are also applied to retail establishments in all residential areas.

But, in parallel with the controls, consumer complaints are acted upon and the food safety monitoring program is implemented, within which samples are taken from a number of different products and tested in the laboratory.

In the first six months of the year, the AUV's inspection services performed a total of 22,564 checks, during which only 1,072 non-conformities were found, for which appropriate measures were taken.

About 54 tons of food were destroyed by inspectors and operators as unsafe, the majority or 53,070 kilograms of food of animal origin.