South Africa`s Department of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries has suspended the meat imports from Brazil as a result of the “Brazilian meat scandal” which has raised an international outcry from the affected communities. South Africa took these actions after the Brazilian police raided several meat producers for allegedly paying bribes to inspectors to certify meat that was either rotten or tainted with Salmonella.

Brazil which is one of the world`s largest exporter of meat has been allegedly exporting expired and “`weak meat” which was substandard and did not meet the international standards of meat meant for exporting. Brazil`s largest meat producers BRF and JBS were among the raided establishments. They are being accused of paying inspectors some bribes to overlook their duties and allow meat that has expired to pass through the Brazilian borders to foreign markets.

South Africa is one of the largest importers of Brazilian meat in the world and the extent of damage caused by the Brazilian scandal is yet to be known. This practice of exporting expired meat by Brazil may go back a period of more than a year as the discoveries were only recent. South Africa has requested the Brazilian authorities to forward official information and a list of firms that have been caught up in the scandal so as to track and stop containers headed for South Africa.

South Africa imports chicken from Brazil and in 2016 alone, more than 10.3 million chickens found their way onto South Africa shelves each week and this is equivalent to 57 673 tons. The chicken industry in South Africa is also in a crisis as it is facing stiff competition from cheap chicken imports from foreign countries with Brazil being one of them. The imports are now equivalent to local production and this has destroyed jobs and killed local production in South Africa`s Chicken Industry.

 

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