Due to salmonella contamination, Swiss chocolatier Barry Callebaut stops making products with cocoa

Brussels. The Swiss company Barry Callebaut, a world giant in the cocoa and chocolate segment, announced that experts detected the presence of salmonella in its factory in Wieze, Belgium, where production was stopped.

"Our experts identified lecithin as the source of the contamination," the firm said in a statement upon detecting salmonella "in a batch manufactured in Wieze" at its factory northeast of Brussels.

The company announced that “all chocolate products manufactured in Wieze after June 25 have been blocked” and that the production lines “will be disinfected before restarting”.

"Barry Callebaut is in contact with all customers who may have received contaminated products," he said.

Korneel Warlop, a spokesman for the firm, told AFP that "most of the contaminated products are still in the Wieze factory" and a small amount "with our customers."

The firm was already in contact with 73 clients to ensure "that there is no contamination of consumers," he said.

According to the company, 72 of those 73 clients had already confirmed that the batches suspected of contamination were identified and their distribution was suspended, while awaiting confirmation from the last of the receiving clients.
A giant of the sector

Warlop said the Belgian Food Safety Agency had been informed of what had happened. In turn, the entity confirmed that it was "gathering information to be able to trace the contamination."

The company's factory in Wieze does not produce chocolates intended for direct marketing to consumers.

The Barry Callebaut group supplies cocoa and chocolate-based preparations to numerous companies in the food sector, in particular to major brands in the chocolate sector such as Hershey, Mondelez or Nestlé.

According to its 2021/2022 balance, its annual sales reached 2.2 million tons in that period.

Its headquarters are in Zurich, Switzerland, although it has some 60 production units around the world.

In April, the Belgian Food Safety Agency had already ordered the closure of a Kinder factory, belonging to the Italian group Ferrero, due to an outbreak of salmonella.

The Belgian justice did not authorize until June the reopening - for a trial period - of the Ferrero subsidiary in the town of Arlon (southern Belgium), where the products contaminated with salmonella were manufactured.

The factory was allowed to reopen for three months, during which each ingredient will be analyzed before the distribution and sale of the chocolates.