In response to information that the Korean Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) has issued a recall and sales suspension for the affected products, Vietnamese food watchdog has contacted the Korean Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) to verify the information.
The MFDS has reported that Korean authorities have launched an investigation into an incident involving the contamination of sterilized milk products with detergent during production at the Gwangju Factory of Maeil Dairy. Maeil Dairies' original sterilized milk - which were manufactured on September 19 with a consumption deadline of February 16, 2025.
The investigation by Korean authorities revealed that the incident at the Gwangju Factory of Maeil Dairy was caused by an operator error during the production process. For approximately one second, the detergent valve was inadvertently left open, allowing detergent containing 2.8 percent sodium hydroxide to contaminate the product filling line. Based on production capacity, it is estimated that approximately 50 products were affected by this incident.
Maeil Dairy has voluntarily recalled all products manufactured on that day as a precautionary measure. The MFDS has instructed the factory to rectify the operational error and implement measures to prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future.
The MFDS has verified that the impacted milk products were solely distributed within the domestic market of Korea, with all deliveries made to a single site. No exports of these affected items occurred.
The Vietnam Food Safety Authority will persist in its vigilant monitoring of this situation and will issue updates as further information is received from the MFDS.
