HCM CITY — Rising food safety concerns are prompting increasing numbers of more office workers and students to have their lunches prepared at home and packed in stainless steel containers. The stainless steel containers have gained popularity particularly after the disposable Styrofoam boxes were found to have cancer causing substances.
"I would stay hungry rather than eat food in disposable boxes," said Trinh Ngoc Van, chief accountant at Top Solvent Viet Nam, adding she has said no to disposable food boxes for a long time.
"The way they are transported in the streets is not hygienic at all, not to mention the fact that they are unhealthy."
She just needs to prepare more food the previous evening so that she can have some leftover for lunch the next day.
"They are cheap, clean and not time-consuming," she said, explaining that home-made lunches can save her time taken to eat out.
"All my female colleagues at the office are also carrying ready-to-eat lunches from home," she added.
It's not only cheaper than eating out, "we also have full control over the food we eat", said Tran Thi Lan, a manager at the East Asia Bank's headquarters in Phu Nhuan District.
"What's more, we don't have to go out in the intense heat of the summer," she added.
Like Van, Lan said she had been carrying her lunch in stainless food containers for five years now and was not the only one doing so in her office.
At lunch time every day, around 20 female workers at the bank take out their food containers and have lunch at the office cafeteria.
At Viet Duc Company, an optical cable maker, up to 80 per cent of staff carry lunch packed at home, according to managing director Nguyen Van Nghia.
"We even placed a microwave in the office for the staff to warm up their lunches," he said.
Binh Thanh District's Ly Kieu Ngoc Hanh, who has prepared lunch boxes for her husband to take to his office in District 5 for many years, said he could save up to 50 per cent of the money he spent on eating out.
"Now he can have time for a nap," she said, "I can also invest all my love in the food I prepare for him."
At the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, desks in classes are turned into dining tables as students bring out their home-made lunches in various containers from stainless to plastic boxes to eat during lunch time.
"I cannot afford to eat out, while some of my classmates just eat junk food for lunch," said Kim Thu, a journalism student from Long An Province.
"Even though lunches get cool at lunch time, I still find them delicious," she added.
Nguyen Manh Hung, a student majoring in biologic technology at the University of Natural Sciences, said warnings against disposable lunch boxes have appeared on some students' forums online.
"They recommend that we should buy stainless steel containers to contain food," he said, adding that he had carried lunches prepared by his sister ever since he got into the university. — VNS