The Party “Action and Solidarity” (PAS) suggests transferring the responsibility for the supply of education institutions with food products to school food combines. In a news conference, the party’s secretary general Igor Grosu said this will lead to lower costs and to a higher quality of food given to children, IPN reports.

“According to our estimates, this will enable to reduce the purchase costs by 10-15% following the increase in the volumes of bought food. Unlike other business entities, these school combines already have sufficient storage and packing capacities and capacities to supply products to education institutions,” stated Igor Grosu. According to him, it would be much simpler to monitor these combines. The PAS members also suggest that the cooks working for education institutions should be subordinate to these combines.

“Education and health services must be provided by specialized institutions and this is the key mission. The medical staff should be managed by the Public Health Centers or Family Doctors Centers. This will enable to increase the salaries and the quality of services as well,” stated the PAS secretary general.

According to the PAS, for these proposals to be implemented, the legal framework concerning school combines, which are state-owned institutions, but are not managed by the municipality, should be modified. “The modification of the legal framework will enable to transfer the medical workers under the management of medical institutions. Furthermore, the municipality will have to create a subprogram to modernize the cooking facilities in education institutions,” stated Igor Grosu.

He also said that, of the 30 warning letters sent by the local authorities to business entities that supply food to education institutions in 2015, 26 concerned one company. The letters referred to the suspicious quality of meat and fish products, to cases when the business entity didn’t supply food products or the supplied foods didn’t comply with the contract requirements and when safety certificates and marking about the use-by date were absent.