SAPPORO – Scandal-tainted Snow Brand Milk Products Co. has admitted using butter that had exceeded its consume-by date in processed milk and other dairy products since March 2001, sources close to the case said Saturday.
The sources said the dairy-products maker collected some 2,300 tons of butter that was too old to sell from a factory in Bekkai, eastern Hokkaido, and extended the use-by date by one year. The Hokkaido government has warned the firm that, “Such an act could lead to a misunderstanding.”
The revelation is a fresh blow to the major firm, which has already been hard hit by the beef-mislabeling scandal involving a subsidiary, Snow Brand Foods Co.
According to Snow Brand officials, the company had excessive inventories of butter as a result of a food poisoning scandal in June 2000, and the decision was taken to rewrite the expiry date, which was originally set at 18 months from the date of production.
The company tested the quality of the 2,300 tons of butter by January 2002, re-packaged it and printed a new expiry date, adding one year from the date the firm checked the safety of the product.
The butter was then delivered to the company’s factories to be incorporated into products such as processed milk and ice cream. Some 760 tons of the repackaged butter has been used in other products. The company has another 1,800 tons of expired butter that it was planning to repackage and give new expiry dates, the sources said.
Following the scandal over the deliberate mislabeling of beef products by a subsidiary, Snow Brand Foods, officials of the parent firm decided to report this latest case to the Nakashibetsu city health center on Jan. 25.
According to an investigation by the health center, the oldest butter had its expiry date changed to 3 1/2 years after it had been produced.
Officials of the prefectural government said the level of bacteria in the butter that could cause food-poisoning is lower than average and that it meets standards set by the Food Sanitation Law. But they have instructed the company that rewriting expiry dates can only be done based on scientific data.
Under a revised health ministry ordinance, products’ freshness data can be extended for foodstuffs kept for a relatively long time if they are stored under certain conditions.
Bekkai factory head Shinji Iwasawa said, “We confirmed that the quality of the butter would not change for four years as it has been stored at a temperature of minus 18 degrees, but we will consider disposing of the remaining butter in question.”
Dumping all the butter will cost the company between 2 billion yen and 3 billion yen, he said.
Snow Brand Milk Managing Director Hideki Takenouchi said at a press conference in Sapporo that the company extended the expiry date after scientific data confirmed the quality of the butter could be maintained for four years after it had been produced.
“While we have now suspended using the expired butter, we hope we can use it as it is a precious dairy resource and we do not want to waste it,” he said.
On Friday, Snow Brand Foods said it will disband in April and most of its 1,000 employees will be fired in March in the wake of the scandal involving the deliberate mislabeling of beef products, which came to light in January. The scandal dealt an additional blow to Snow Brand Milk, whose sales plummeted in fiscal 2000 in the wake of the food-poisoning scandal in the summer of 2000.