MELON: Italian police have seized more than 60 tones of unhygienic seasonal pastries and 650 people charged and ordered to pay a total of €670,000 in fines in a nationwide campaign targeting fraudulent food producers ahead of Christmas and
Members of the food safety and health unit (Nas) carried out more than 2,000 inspections more than 100 a day of factories, bakeries, cheese producers and fruit and vegetable markets in the past three weeks leading up to the festive season.
In a statement released here the other day, police said inspectors found one in five of the firms had breached food regulations and reported 600 violations of national and local regulations.
In the southern city of Salerno police said they seized 18,000 kilos of chocolates and other sweets with a use by date that had expired in 2007. In the same location they had seized a factory where they allegedly found decomposing figs filled with parasites.
Among the food seizures were 30,000 kilograms of sweets and pastries and 1,000 kilograms of fish products. Police said the products were in poor condition, had exceeded their use by date or stored in poor conditions.
Others were being labeled and sold as home-made products when they had been mass produced.
