Strengthening street food safety through Behavioral change Communication among street food vendors in Dhaka city

Project Brief: The study was an experimental design including pre and post intervention and conducted in ward 9 and ward 37 of Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC) area where the first study of street food intervention has taken place. The objectives were to, 1) improve knowledge and practices about safe street food handling among the street food vendors; 2) reduce concentration of microbial contamination in the street food by 25%; 3) reduce concentration of microbial contamination in the hands of street food vendors by 25%. The study offered a modified BCC intervention package along with a street food cart among the same 100 vendors (participated in the phase 1) who had earlier participated as intervention population. Simultaneously, it offered the previous BCC intervention as it was without a street food cart to 100 street food vendors in ward 37 who had earlier participated as control population. An audio visual training package was developed and trained to the intervention group with continuous one to one health education at the vending place. Simultaneously, group demonstration sessions were held every month and re emphasized the BCC messages by using a modified training video based on the material developed in the first phase.