Ferrero offers guarantees to "salmonella plant" employees

As Ferrero‘s Belgian chocolate factory in Arlon could remain closed for at least three weeks, investigations into the source of the recent salmonella outbreak are ongoing. In the meantime, employees will continue to be paid.

Three-week arrangement

Staff and management of the Ferrero factory in Arlon, which is believed to be the source of a series of salmonella contaminations, met on Tuesday. The factory has been closed since Friday because the Belgian food agency FASFC withdrew its production licence. This week the factory was supposed to close anyway for planned maintenance work, but now the third largest Ferrero factory will probably remain closed longer. For how long, nobody knows yet.

Next week a further sanitation will take place and then it will be up to the FASFC to determine when the Arlon factory will be able to get its licence back. Nevertheless, the 700 employees of the plant wanted more clarity on their position. They now have it: until at least 8 May, all employees will continue to be paid by Ferrero. Nor will they lose any income.

Every ten days, the unions and management will meet to discuss the current situation. “Ferrero does not want to open as soon as possible, but above all wants to manage everything properly,” Didier Pironet of the Belgian ABVV trade union told De Tijd. “I have the impression that Ferrero has learned from its communication mistakes,” said Romuald Geury of trade union ACV. The Italian chocolate maker also promised that it would continue to invest in the site and that there would be no redundancies.

Infections continue to rise

The exact origin of the salmonella contamination is not yet clear. Possibly raw materials at the confectionery plant were contaminated. According to De Standaard, the buttermilk tanks in particular are under investigation. This also raises the question of whether contaminated ingredients could have been passed on to other factories.

The European Health Agency (ECDC) and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) have requested further investigation. In the meantime, the Belgian food agency is continuing to carry out checks in the factory, and the public prosecutor of the province of Luxembourg has also opened an investigation.

In the meantime, it has already been confirmed that 119 salmonella contaminations across Europe originated from the Ferrero factory in Arlon. A further 31 cases are ‘probably’ attributable to the consumption of Kinder products. In Belgium, 29 cases can be traced back to the factory with certainty, while a further 20 cases are under investigation.