courtesy: root simple
The fast food chain Kentucky Fried chicken has halted all imports of chicken from China.
The giant chain had at least 1,000 Chinese chicken farms in its supply chain.
Apparently the move was made to offset the contamination scandal of the past year. A lot of the imported chicken from the Shanghai hub had been tested and the result was that the chickens exhibited high level of antibiotics.
Antibiotics, like amantadines, are often given routinely to chickens to prevent avian flu outbreaks. However such practice makes the chicken non exportable, since the chickens so treated are not acceptable in many countries.
In fact such a widespread use of the antibiotics is a root cause of the avian flu's resistance to this once effective, first line of defence antibiotic, since the chickens have been given the drug often routinely to prevent culls.
The ban on Chinese chicken imports has impacted the Chinese poultry sector heavily. They have seen a fall of more than 6% in the export of their product.
To quell fears of tainted chicken products, KFC has vowed to stop imports of chickens from farms that are deemed at risk of antibiotic use, and improve the screening process for its imports.
On their part, the poultry producers in China have declared that they are committed to providing customers with a safe product. This
followed an admission from the Chinese poultry farmers involved in the scandal last year that they had failed to
inform Chinese authorities about the high levels of antibiotics in their
chicken.
KFC has also promised to better communicate with the public and the American controlling authorities.
Source: France 24/ 2.26.13
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