OSI Chairman Arrives In Shanghai

Sheldon Lavin, the chairman of the Aurora, Illinois meat producer at the center of a reported safety scandal that has dragged in McDonald’s in mainland China, Hong Kong and Japan, has arrived in Shanghai and is due to join a press conference with other senior company officials this afternoon, government-published Shanghai Daily said today.

The officials will meet with the Shanghai Food and Drug Administration this morning, the newspaper said.

An undercover Shanghai TV reporter posing as a worker at Shanghai Husi, the OSI unit involved in the alleged scandal, filmed colleagues combining expired meat with fresh cuts and then lying to McDonald’s inspectors, Chinese media reported earlier this month. 

"To help rebuild the trust of customers and consumers, as well as to cooperate with the official investigatory process, we are compelled to withdraw all products manufactured by Shanghai Husi from the marketplace," OSI said in a statement on its Chinese website on Saturday. OSI is conducting a "thorough internal investigation" into possible failures by former and current senior management, the statement said.

McDonald’s is facing an investigation in Hong Kong linked to Shanghai Husi products, Hong Kong media have reported.