ABSTRACT

The study focuses on hygiene practices and customer’s choice of street food vendors in Umuahia North Local Government Area, Abia state. Four research objectives guided the study: to determine the influence of personal hygiene practices of food vendors on customer’s choice in Umuahia North LGA, to determine the influence of environmental sanitation of food vendors on customer’s choice in Umuahia North LGA, to determine the influence of food handling practices of food vendors on customer’s choice in Umuahia North LGA, and to determine the influence of waste management practices of food vendors on customer’s choice in Umuahia North LGA. The study adopted a survey research design, utilizing a structured questionnaire to collect data from 240 respondents in Umuahia North LGA, semi-structured interview guide for customers and observation checklists. Descriptive statistics, including frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviation with the use of SPSS were employed for data presentation and analysis, while inferential statistics, specifically Multiple Regression was used to test the influence of hygiene practices on customer’s choice. The findings revealed that personal hygiene (β = 0.689, p = 0.051), and environmental sanitation (β = -1.437, p = 0.000), exhibited strong significant influence on customer’s choice, while food handling (β = -0.437, p = 0.136), and waste management (β = 0.283, p = 0.076), showed little influence on customer’s choice. Recommendations include strengthening vendor training and awareness, provision of basic sanitation infrastructure, regulatory oversight and monitoring, consumer education campaigns, integration of hygiene into vendor licensing. This research contributes to the growing body of knowledge by providing evidence on how hygiene practices of food vendors in Umuahia North directly influence consumer choice, thereby addressing a contextual gap in Nigerian street food research, the findings provided practical recommendations for policymakers, health officers, and vendors to make use of tiny transparent iron nets to prevent flies, dust and food contamination.