A Homever store, a local hypermarket franchise |
Switch Feared to Trigger Flood of Copycat Cases Once Markets Open Up
 By Kim Hyun-cheol
Staff Reporter
One of the nation's biggest discount outlet franchises has been found to have sold U.S. beef as Australian.
The switch is likely to stir more concerns anew on the policy of disclosing the origin of food at a time of lingering public anger ahead of the pending resumption of U.S beef imports. Homever denied it was intentional but failed to elucidate.
A raid on a Homever outlet located in southern Incheon revealed Saeachim, one of the contractors there, was selling U.S. beef displayed as Australian, the national Agricultural Products Quality Management Service (NAQS) said.
The agency seized some 54 kilograms of marinated meat for bulgogi, a Korean-style barbeque dish, from the store and is now investigating the case.
The meat in question was imported before Seoul banned U.S. beef in October last year, according to the NAQS. About 2.6 kilograms of it were sold Sunday, when NAQS officers and reporters from MBC made an unexpected visit to the store.
The information on mislabeling was given to the agency through MBC, after a whistle blower contacted the local television broadcaster.
An employee of Saeachim company thawed some 10 kilograms of beef from storage to marinate on Saturday night, then attached barcodes saying "Australian'' before putting it on display, according to the investigation.
Homever denied linking the incident to the retailer itself, saying the contractor was running meat booths in 11 Homever stores but is only a rent payer for the space, not an affiliate of the retailer.
No malicious intention was found, the hypermarket company said.
"They told us it was a mistake and they didn't have time to correct the barcodes because of the abrupt raid on the booth," a Homever spokesman said on condition of anonymity. "No other case like this was found in its other booths. We don't understand how it happened either."
The spokesman, however, declined to answer how the wrong meat could be displayed so easily.
Homever, run by Eland Group since 2006 after the local retailer bought it from French brand Carrefour, is set to merge with Homeplus, the nation's second biggest franchise managed by Samsung Tesco, after a 2.3 trillion-won ($2.2 billion) deal was signed on May 14. It currently operates 35 stores nationwide.
Still, those involved in the case will not be able to avoid legal punishment, the food agency said.
"So far we haven't found anything untoward about the case," a NAQS officer said. "But it certainly has the appearance of such with the wrongly labeled meat on display.''
Violators of the law on labeling food origins can face up to seven years in jail, or a fine of up to 100 million won ($97,700).
Critics argue defects in the retailer's management of origin labeling led to the incident.
When a contractor gets to deal with foods from different countries, Homever receives new barcode tags from it to attach to the food before selling it.
Under the system, however, it is next to impossible for the retailer to spot mistakes of this kind.
The NAQS said more such cases could be possible when imports of U.S. beef starts
The franchise said it is not easy to supervise all the food it deals with in stores, because the amount of food is so large and is often directly managed by subcontractors.
Homever said it will take immediate action including increased monitoring of staff.
"We recalled all the sold meat and are reviewing what we can do legally now,'' a Homever executive said. "Even though Saeachim says it was purely accidental, we still could terminate the contract and expel its booths from our stores because it's a serious contract violation.''
``It maybe the fault of the contractor company, a sort of a tenant of the store, but that still doesn't change the fact the meat was sold at a Homever store,'' a user of Agora, an online forum of a local portal Web site Daum, said about the incident.
"It is irresponsible for Homever to try to get away with the criticism by just blaming the contractor, because most customers will buy the meat believing the meat is still a product of the store,'' he said.
hckim@koreatimes.co.kr
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[단독] 르노삼성, 본사 모델로 한국 공략
