http://money.163.com/14/0720/20/A1KHBRO6002526O3.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-28399162
+ Show Spoiler +
Chinese branches of fast food chains, including McDonald's and KFC, have stopped using meat from a supplier in Shanghai following allegations it sold them out of date meat.
According to Xinhua, the state-owned news agency, authorities in Shanghai have ordered the suspension of operations at Shanghai Husi Food Co.
Reports by local media said that Husi had re-processed expired meat products.
McDonald's and KFC said they had stopped using meat from Husi.
In a statement posted on its website, translated from Mandarin, the Shanghai Municipal Food and Drug Administration said it had "decided to investigate claims of the alleged use of expired raw food material production and the processing of it in food".
Shanghai Husi is the Chinese unit of US-based food supplier OSI Group.
According to OSI's website, the company's unit in China "started to provide high-quality products to McDonald's China" in 1992.
The unit began supplying Yum China in 2008. Yum China manages the KFC and Pizza Hut chains and its sales have been hit by recent health scares.
Yum's sales dipped after a report in 2012 said two of its suppliers were providing chickens with excessive levels of antibiotics.
Just as the firm was recovering from those allegations, fears of an outbreak of bird flu in the country dented its sales.
Practices 'unacceptable'
Benjamin Cavender from consultancy China Market Research Group, based in Shanghai said: "Yum has just started rebuilding credibility and had some decent sales which just came out for the second quarter.
"I think this is really going to set them back."
According to figures from research firm Euromonitor, McDonald's and Yum are the two leading fast food chains in China, based on sales.
Speaking to Reuters a spokesperson for McDonald's in China said: "If proven, the practices outlined in the reports are completely unacceptable to McDonald's anywhere in the world"
She added that the firm used a "few protein suppliers" in China.
According to Xinhua, the state-owned news agency, authorities in Shanghai have ordered the suspension of operations at Shanghai Husi Food Co.
Reports by local media said that Husi had re-processed expired meat products.
McDonald's and KFC said they had stopped using meat from Husi.
In a statement posted on its website, translated from Mandarin, the Shanghai Municipal Food and Drug Administration said it had "decided to investigate claims of the alleged use of expired raw food material production and the processing of it in food".
Shanghai Husi is the Chinese unit of US-based food supplier OSI Group.
According to OSI's website, the company's unit in China "started to provide high-quality products to McDonald's China" in 1992.
The unit began supplying Yum China in 2008. Yum China manages the KFC and Pizza Hut chains and its sales have been hit by recent health scares.
Yum's sales dipped after a report in 2012 said two of its suppliers were providing chickens with excessive levels of antibiotics.
Just as the firm was recovering from those allegations, fears of an outbreak of bird flu in the country dented its sales.
Practices 'unacceptable'
Benjamin Cavender from consultancy China Market Research Group, based in Shanghai said: "Yum has just started rebuilding credibility and had some decent sales which just came out for the second quarter.
"I think this is really going to set them back."
According to figures from research firm Euromonitor, McDonald's and Yum are the two leading fast food chains in China, based on sales.
Speaking to Reuters a spokesperson for McDonald's in China said: "If proven, the practices outlined in the reports are completely unacceptable to McDonald's anywhere in the world"
She added that the firm used a "few protein suppliers" in China.
To sum things, a Chinese news network went undercover in a processing factory(Shanghai Husi Food Products LC) that supplied meat to Shanghai based Mcdonald's and Yum Brand restaurants and found out that they were supplying the chains with expired meat products. The company utilized different methods to cover up the expired products such mixing and recooking meats or just by easily changing the expiry dates on the packages.
- Mixing and recooking semi-finished product with raw materials
- Changing "best used by dates" after processing
- Covering up production dates
Here's a video report that the undercover reporter filmed while working there for 2 months.
edit: Skip to after 3:20 mark if you want to see the actual undercover footage.
No need to worry as the worker tells the undercover reporter, "People won't die consuming expired foods!!"
You see the workers causally picking up the expired meat product from the floor, its alright though because it will be cooked!!
I'm not surprised by this considering there has been so many food safety scandals in the past decade in China. Some notorious incidents to name...
Baby-formula lanced with melamine, even now parents still afraid to purchase PRC baby-formula.
Magical "beef extract" additive which you can magically convert other meat products into more expensive beef in about 90 minutes.
Gutter oil, this by far is the most terrifying. It is essentially what you think, the recycling and reusing of waste cooking oil from restaurants. But this includes discarded food, animal fats, skins and internal organs all processed together and then sold to be used again. It will be filtered and laced with chemicals to come out like new and its very difficult to distinguish from the real thing. I'm sure I have consumed it one way or another.