JEDDAH, 1 March 2006 — Parents have complained repeatedly to school officials about peddlers selling spoiled food to children near schools.
The peddlers station themselves in front of elementary schools when school is out and sell a number of different types of food. Most of it is unhealthy and parents are calling for an end to the sales.
Muhammad Al-Zahrani, the principal of Al-Thagr Elementary School, said the school administration had contacted the municipality many times about the sale of unhealthy food to children.
“We have complained about the problem but we have not had any response from them. For our part, we are trying to educate the children so that they will not buy the food. Children of course are curious and they buy the food without knowing how substandard it is, where it came from or how it has been prepared,” Al-Zahrani told Arab News.
Fatima Al-Otaibi, at a girls’ elementary school in Jeddah’s Bani Malek district, said whenever they chase the peddlers away from the school’s front door, they go to the back and sell food to the children.
Muhammad Al-Sufyani, a parent, said he was afraid that children might catch some disease because of the food since it was exposed to both sun and dust. “I have forbidden my son from buying from the peddlers. The municipality should do something about them since it is not the duty of the schools to keep chasing them away,” he said.
