Belgium: World’s biggest chocolate plant found to be contaminated with Salmonella bacteria

Salmonella bacteria have been found in the world’s biggest chocolate plant managed by Swiss giant Barry Callebaut in the Belgian town of Wieze, said the firm on Thursday, June 30.

A spokesperson of the company said that production had been stopped at the factory, which makes liquid chocolate in wholesale batches for over 73 customers making confectionaries.

Spokesperson Korneel Warlop stated, “All products that were being manufactured since the test have been halted.”

Barry Callebaut is presently contacting all clients who may have got contaminated products. Chocolate production in Wieze stays suspended till further orders.

Most of the products that were found to be contaminated are still at the location, Warlop said.

But the firm has called all its clients and asked them not to send any products they have made with chocolate since June 25 at the Wieze plant, located in Flanders, northwest of Brussels.

The food safety agency of Belgium, AFSCA, has been informed of the situation, and a spokesman said it had also opened an investigation.

The Wieze plant doesn’t make chocolates to be sold directly to the customers, and the firm has no logic yet to think that any contaminated products made by clients have made it to stores and shops.

The fear comes a few weeks after a matter of chocolates infected with salmonella in the Ferrero factory in Arlon in southern Belgium producing Kinder chocolates.

On June 17, the Belgian health officials disclosed that they had given the orders to resume the Italian giant’s factory for three months.

Swiss group Barry Callebaut provides chocolate products and cocoa to several companies in the food industry, including industry giants like Mondelez, Hershey, Nestle and Unilever.

This plant is the world’s most significant in this sector, and its yearly sale was 2.2 million tonnes in the financial year 2021-2022.