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On June 20, the General Administration of Customs had sent letters to 42 key countries, requesting their government authorities and food production companies to strictly follow the food safety production guidelines jointly issued by the FAO and the WHO, in order to prevent exported food from being contaminated by SARS-CoV-2. They also informed that imported cold foods would be tested for the virus to protect their country from COVID-19.
It was stated in a National Health Commission press conference that "there is only a small chance of food being contaminated with the virus, but that it would be possible with slaughterhouses around the world having had many workers sick with COVID-19".
China took cautionary measures to suspend the import of the products from some slaughterhouses with COVID-19 outbreaks among the workers. The imports of products from 23 overseas meat companies have been suspended, including Tönnies of Germany (pork plant), Tyson of the United States (poultry plant), Agra of Brazil (beef plant), and Tulip of the United Kingdom (pork plant). Many countries and enterprises are actively cooperating, and 10 of these 23 enterprises suspended their exports to China according to Chinese requirements.
On July 10, SARS-CoV-2 was detected in the container environment and outer packaging of a shipment of frozen shrimp from three Ecuadorian shrimp companies that did not have food safety measures in place.
July 21, 2020/ 333 Staff with information from the General Administration of Customs and the National Health Commission of the People's Republic of China.
