Danone Romania withdraws products following possible aflatoxin contamination

Newsroom 19/03/2013 | 08:37

Dairy producer Danone has withdrawn several products from the local market as part of a precautionary measure after it was revealed the products could contain milk contaminated with aflatoxin, a highly carcinogenic substance.

Danone has also blocked 75 tons of products in its warehouses after aflatoxin was detected in the milk of one of its suppliers.

The food-safety alert over milk infested with aflatoxin began two weeks ago after milk containing aflatoxin above the legal limits was reportedly found in Romanian farms, collection centers and processing facilities.

After the National Sanitary Veterinary and Food Safety Authority (ANSVSA) ordered testing it was revealed at the end of last week that a total of seven farms, collection centers and processing facilities had been found to have infested milk, but the authorities said contaminated milk had not made it to the shelves.

Following intense media scrutiny of the episode, Romanians have shown signs of losing trust in the quality of milk available in retail networks. Two out of five Romanians have scrubbed milk off their shopping list over the past week, according to a survey released last Thursday by Rogalski Grigoriu Public Relations, while only 43 percent of respondents said they still trusted the quality of the milk they bought.