Creative Industry

ServeSafe: Ensures Food Safety of National School Feeding Progamme- ITPN

Published

4 years ago

September 21, 2022

In line with the desire of the present administration to empower a minimum of one million Nigerians annually with hospitality trade jobs in the National Home Grown School Feeding Program, quality and safety of food service delivery must be ensured so that the feeding system will not be compromised in terms of nutritional values, safe consumption and good health of the benefiting pupils of the scheme.

The National President of the Institute for Tourism Professionals of Nigeria (ITPN), Chief Abiodun Odusanwo, who stated this during the Food Quality Assurance Supervision Training Program for Supervisors of the Home Grown School Feeding Program in Abuja, further noted that this was meant to strengthen the skill levels of the public officers performing this important regulatory and enforcement role in order to reduce the incidents of food poisoning and food borne illnesses in the implementation of the scheme.

Chief Odusanwo said that the Servesafe initiative is a Food Safety Quality Assurance Management System which covers environmental and public health food safety program, designed to create public awareness and a safeguard of the dangers associated with food poisoning and contamination at premises where food is processed, cooked, served or handled, adding that it is further meant to educate, intensify and quality-assured food premises through inspection and certification.

He disclosed that the key challenges facing the enhancement of food safety in the country include lack of awareness of the socio-economic importance of food safety, absence of adequate information on incidence of food borne disease outbreaks, lack of understanding of food safety and quality standards as outlined in international agreements and the inability to enforce compliance commensurate with the demands of enforcement of regulatory bodies, noting further that it is in response to these challenges that the Servesafe Quality Assurance training was organized.

The program which was done by the Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development in collaboration with the Institute for Tourism Professionals of Nigeria, saw participants of the Three-Day Training Programme drawn from all training centres across the country drilled on key food safety areas including: ‘Overview of Safe Food’; ‘How to Avoid Food Contamination’; ‘The Servesafe Food Handler’ and ‘Servesafe Facilities and Pest Management and Control’.

Other are: ‘Servesafe flow of Food Production and Service’; Servesafe Cleaning and Sanitation’; Servesafe Flow of Food Production and Service’ and ‘Servesafe Food Safety Management System’ and were presented with Certificate acknowledging them as qualified food safety supervisors in the country’s food value chain and hospitality trades.

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Creative Industry

FG Backs MyCityApp Launch of 100-Day Tourism Calendar to Drive $100bn Economic Growth

Published

3 weeks ago

September 15, 2026

The Gleamer

Joel Ajayi

The Federal Government has thrown its weight behind the launch of MyCityApp, a Nigerian city discovery and tourism platform designed to aggregate festivals, concerts, cultural events and lifestyle experiences into a single digital calendar.

The platform, which flags off the 100-Day Tourism Calendar, was unveiled on Monday at the Ember2Remember National Stakeholders’ Conference in Victoria Island, Lagos, with the initiative targeting Nigeria’s estimated $100 billion tourism and creative economy opportunity.

In a statement issued on Tuesday in Abuja by the Media and Publicity Adviser to the Minister of Art, Culture, Tourism and the Creative Economy, Nneka Ikem Anibeze, the ministry said the conference was aimed at mobilising public and private stakeholders to transform the September-to-December festive period into jobs, investment and economic growth.

Speaking at the unveiling, the Minister, Hannatu Musa Musawa, said millions of visitors travel across Nigeria every year to celebrate, reconnect and experience the country’s diverse culture, stressing that the festive season could be deliberately organised and monetised to strengthen tourism’s contribution to the economy.

“This initiative is about moving beyond the traditional concept of a festive season. It is about deliberately organising, packaging, promoting, and monetising one of the most economically active periods in our national calendar,” Musawa said.

She noted that every visitor generates economic activity across several sectors, including aviation, transportation, hospitality, restaurants, entertainment, retail, technology, artisans and local communities.

The Minister commended MyCityApp Chief Executive Officer, Mrs Ifeoma Chukwu, for her vision and commitment to the initiative.

She urged state governments, event organisers, tourism operators, hospitality businesses and other stakeholders to list their festivals, concerts, exhibitions, food experiences, cultural celebrations, fashion and sporting events on the national calendar.

Musawa said the platform would enable Nigerians, members of the diaspora and international visitors to discover tourism and entertainment experiences across the country from a single, credible source.

Earlier, Chukwu said Nigeria’s rich cultural heritage and creative sector provided enormous opportunities for tourism-driven economic growth.

She cited the contributions of tourism to the economies of countries such as Spain, France and the United States, arguing that Nigeria could equally build a $100 billion tourism economy.

Also present were Lagos State Commissioner for Tourism, Arts and Culture, Toke Benson-Awoyinka; Enugu State Commissioner for Culture and Tourism, Ugochi Madueke; NCAC Director-General, Obi Asika; National Gallery of Art Director-General, Ahmed Sodangi; ARCON Director-General, Dr Olalekan Fadolapo; and MTN Nigeria CEO, Dr Karl Toriola.

MyLagosApp and MyCityApp will serve as the digital engines of the calendar, distributing events through a 360-degree media ecosystem to audiences in Nigeria and the diaspora.

Stakeholders were encouraged to upload their events on MyCityApp to participate in the national tourism calendar urging them to upload events on http://www.MyCityApp.io.

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