Friday, December 13, 2013

CFIA identifies import flaws


The Canadian Food Inspection Agency apparently stepped up its inspection of food imports, seizing, detaining of disposing of products on close to 200 occasions.

The inspectors even caught flawed imports destined for Canada’s three largest supermarket chains and one of the largest foodservice companies.

There were 86 cases in Quebec, 73 in Ontario, 31 across Western Canada and three in the Atlantic Region during July, August and September.

In Ontario, Sobeys had grapes seized, Sysco had boneless beef detained, L.N. Reynolds had several seizures involving boneless beef and veal, Export Packers Co. Ltd. also had several involving canned albacore tuna and bone-in pork and H.J. Heinz at Leamington had some parmesan chicken detained.

In Quebec, the Maxi chain owned by Loblaws had more than a dozen detentions of ground chicken breast, Metro had one detention of frozen boneless beef and Agro Meats had half a dozen detentions of lamb poducts.

In the West, Loblaws’ T&T Supermarket chain had two detentions of apples.

The infractions inspectors identified ranged from biological to chemical to lack of proper documentation and often the website says only “other non-compliance”.