With the advent of the holy month of Ramadan, some unscrupulous traders are marketing large quantities of expired and rotten food which they have stored in warehouses in order to exploit the usual increase in prices during the holy month, the presence of large numbers of Umrah pilgrims and visitors and the lack of supervision of government authorities, Al-Watan Arabic daily reported Friday. Dr. Muhammad Al-Fautawi, Director General of Environmental Health in Makkah Mayoralty, warned that supervision over coldstores and large food shops would be intensified and food items that have expired or have been stored improperly would be confiscated. He said that during the past two weeks, the Environmental Health Administration confiscated 70 tons of expired food and that inspection tours would continue in coordination with subsidiary Makkah municipalities. Dr. Al-Fautawi said that his organization has formed a joint committee with the Ministry of Commerce and Industry to carry out surprise inspection tours of shops and supermarkets because at this time of the year some traders seek to make a quick profit at the expense of the health of consumers. He appealed to all consumers to cooperate by reporting every shop that offers expired food items for sale in an attempt to exploit the increase of prices during Ramadan. A number of consumers including Ghazi Al-Hetairishi, Saad Al-Magatti and Saleem Al-Ma'badi pointed out that the lack of supervision by the concerned government authorities, especially the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and Consumer Protection Society, and the nonexistence of deterrent penalties results in some traders attempting to market spoiled and expired food each year in the last few weeks of Sha'ban. These consumers stress the need for defaming such merchants so that they do not repeat their actions in future. They add that the greed of some merchants leads them to tamper with prices, which end up differing from one shop to another, and to reduce the price of some commodities only to increase those of others in order to compensate for the discounts which they advertise to attract customers. Meanwhile, consumers Shujaa' Al-Harbi, Mastoor Al-Mattrafi and Abdul Aziz Al-Amri said that merchants are well aware of the weak supervision of the marketplace by the authorities and that penalties against them in case they are discovered to be selling expired items will not exceed a fine of two percent of their profits from marketing rotten and expired food. For this reason, they called for stiffer penalties to be imposed and said that the authorities should focus on defaming such traders. They also called for increasing the role of the Consumer Protection Society as consumers are suffering from cheating and price hikes without anyone to protect them from the greed of some traders. Muhammad Bin Nahar, lawyer and legal consultant, stressed the importance of setting deterrent penalties for merchants who are tampering with the health of the general public. He said that such traders should be taken to the General Court and be defamed in local newspapers at their own expense which would force them to respect the rights of consumers. As to the financial penalties, Nahar said they are useless, as a merchant who profits in millions of riyals will not be affected by a fine not exceeding SR5,000. Meanwhile, Sheikh Abdul Mohsin Al-Obaikan, Advisor at the Royal Court, said traders who sell rotten and expired food items are practicing a form of cheating and that the Prophet (peace be upon him) said: “Whoever cheats us is not one of us”. He emphasized that selling rotten and expired food is cheating the public and the money gained from this is haram. He said that such traders should be investigated and referred to the judge in the concerned court to look into the possibility of defaming them. __
