Local supplies of pork are set to drop after the government destroyed 3,500 kilograms of tainted meat from mainland China, and all farms in the area were banned from exporting livestock to Hong Kong.
Tests conducted by the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department late last Thursday found Clenbuterol and Salbutamol, two drugs used to treat asthma, in the urine of 319 pigs from two farms in Jiangxi, a southeastern province in China.
However, the news didn’t reach the government slaughterhouse in time and the animals were killed and sent out to shops. A total of 40 pigs from the batch were distributed to 27 retailers, the FEHD said in a statement.
FEHD officials conducted inspections on Saturday and sealed and marked all of the contaminated pork they found — 3.5 tonnes of meat and offal — to be destroyed. At the moment, it is unclear how much of the tainted meat was sold or eaten before the inspections.
A member of Fresh Meat United, an alliance of meat traders, told SCMP that the pigs were slaughtered at 12am on Friday, but “we were only notified of the problem at 1:30am.”
Dr. Ko Wing-man, the Food and Health Secretary, apologised publicly today for the error and admitted the mechanism for reporting lab results may be flawed. He added that the government is considering compensating affected vendors.
Beijing has since banned all Jiangxi farms from exporting meat to Hong Kong. As Jiangxi currently supplies 20 percent of Hong Kong’s pork, prices will likely rise due to higher demand.
When used on livestock, Clenbuterol and Salbutamol are reported to increase the muscle-to-fat ratio and create leaner meat. Hong Kong laws strictly prohibit the use of both drugs on food.
People who consume meat with excessive amounts of Clenbuterol and Salbutamol may experience dizziness, increased heart rate, headaches, tremors, and nervousness, according to the FEHD.
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