Air passengers were on Monday warned against bringing a particular type of illegal Chinese-branded sausage into the country due to its tendency to spread the African Swine Fever (ASF) virus.
The alert over the safety of the meat, popular among Chinese-style hotpot restaurants, came in a Facebook post by the Department of Livestock Development’s (DLD) Quarantine and Inspection Canine Unit of Suvarnabhumi airport.
According to the post, one of their detection dogs had led them to seize 100 illegal sausages in the luggage hold of a Hainan Airlines flight that had departed from Meilan International Airport in Haikou County, China, on July 13.
The pork sausages in the probe were sold under the name Shuanghui, known to Thai consumers as Lion Brand, and produced by a manufacturer in Henan province. They became especially favoured by consumers following the popularity of Chinese-style hotpot restaurants in Thailand.
Lertchai Lertwut, deputy secretary-general of the Thai Food and Drug Administration (FDA), said none of the sausage brand importers had registered with the FDA, and that is why the packaging does not display a food serial number or legal label.
The lot of defective sausages, 8.5 kilogrammes in total and worth at least 2,000 baht, was immediately seized as a swine fever epidemic has been detected in the country of origin.
Sophat Chawankul, the DLD deputy director-general, said elevated security procedures have been in place since 2018, when rising cases of ASF were first reported in Asia.
At present, those who illegally import livestock and livestock products face up to two years in prison, fines of up to 200,000 baht, or both, he added.
On the FDA’s side, Mr Lertchai said that the importer would be accused of unauthorised food product importation.
They would be detained for no more than three years and pay no more than 30,000 baht in fines.
The sausages were also sent for additional analysis and ahead of charges being filed against the importer after results come back, according to Mr Lertchai.