Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — If you’re thinking of bringing masi saiga and masi Samoa from neighboring Samoa for personal use and instead then turn around and sell it at local stores to make some cash, think again!

As part of inspections for business license renewals for the new year, the Department of Health (DoH) Environmental Health Services Division (EHD) is cracking down on food items with labeling and packaging issues and residents, who are just selling them without a business license and a health permit.

A DoH truck was seen on Thursday morning, Dec. 7, 2022 unloading numerous packages of banana chips and boxes of masi saiga and masi Samoa that were seized from several stores by the EHD team.

EHD Division Head II Aileen Solaita explained that any vendor who prepares food items and gives or sells it to stores must have a business license and a health permit. In addition to getting a health permit, they need to comply with labeling and packaging.

Numerous Ziplock-bags of the popular fried banana chips were also pulled from stores. Solaita said local businesses were warned in the past about proper packaging and sealing of local chips. 

“It's over a year or two [but] they [businesses] still have not followed recommendations and have yet dated the chips to be valid for 1 month,” said Solaita. “Mind you that any packaged food items, if prepared to be sold locally, if not airtight or proper packaging and with proper preservatives to maintain the freshness of chips, these food items cannot last more than a week or a whole month.”

She said Moana Chips is an example of local chips that are properly packaged and labeled to be sold for more than one week or longer and also compiies with DoH sanitary requirements.

DoH is also finding an increasing number of food items from Samoa sold at the local stores but the problem is that the vendors who sell them do not have health permits, which is a requirement as part of the business licensing process. Once a vendor applies for a health permit, DoH goes to their business location to conduct a health inspection.

DoH is not against these food items but vendors must comply with licensing and permitting requirements just like everyone else. Unlike American Samoa, food items from Samoa do not go through approval processes set by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) or the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Instead, Solaita said DoH requires vendors selling these items to submit a health certificate from Samoa’s Ministry of Health stating that the facilities where the food items are made do comply with sanitary conditions and further, that their employees are practicing food safety measures.  

According to Solaita, "We have also received complaints from the public that food items such as masi saiga are dated to be good for 6 months.” [photo: faaTalanoa]

“Here locally, our local vendors such as Pritchards, Local Delight’s and Mele's bakery are making the same products and are only good for 5 days before they are removed and fresh products are supplied for our local vendors. “Their packaging as well is sealed so you can tell if someone has tried to tamper with it, and once opened, the stores should not be selling it anymore.”

However, as for the food items from Samoa, the masi saiga and Samoa masi from Samoa are tied with a knot with the labeling stating that they are good for six months. [photo: faaTalanoa Media]

DoH has received complaints from residents that some of these food productions from Samoa are stale, especially after a month sitting at the store shelves. Other food products do not have dates on them, so DoH is unable to determine when they were made.

The DoH official stressed that while the food items from Samoa are brought here via permits issued by the Department of Agriculture, that does not mean they can be sold at the local stores. Sanitary requirements and food safety practices in the two Samoa are not the same.

Last month, DoH inspected a few businesses in Samoa that want to sell their items here and DoH has provided them with recommendations in order to meet local standards.

 “Once they have passed DoH Health Inspections, I'm sure we can allow them to sell locally,” she said. “We are not stopping anyone from bringing those items in for their families and personal consumption, but once they bring them in for commercial use, then, we [DoH] step in [to check] if they [vendors]… comply with our local standards.

“Businesses have been warned before in the past years and given ample time to comply, but now with the renewal of 2023 inspections, we are now enforcing what we have advised them in the past years to do, but have not.”