Correspondence
Email sent to the communications team at Ahorramas.
The email said: "I’m contacting you in light of our latest investigation which concerns the use of forced labor in China’s food processing industry, and a link we’ve discovered between companies engaged in such practices and one of your suppliers - Nomad Foods. Ahorramas sells Findus branded white fish products. Our research shows that Northseafood Holland and Unibond Seafood International are white fish suppliers to Nomad Foods brands, which include the Iglo, Birds Eye and Findus ranges retailing across Europe. Northseafood Holland has imported shipments of white fish, including pollock, from the processor, Yantai Sanko Fisheries Co. Ltd., based in China. Yantai Sanko Fisheries Co. Ltd. has received persons from the Xinjiang region of China under a government labor transfer program since 2019 and until at least April 2023. Northseafood Holland B.V. has also been supplied white fish by Yantai Longwin Foods Co. Ltd., a company linked to Yantai Sanko Fisheries through corporate ownership. Our investigation has found Uyghurs working at Yantai Longwin Foods Co. Ltd. since at least 2020 and until at least July 2023. Unibond Seafood has imported shipments of white fish, including cod and pollock, from Qingdao Tianyuan Aquatic Foodstuff Co. Ltd. since the Chinese plant is known to have first started using Xinjiang labor in 2018. Our evidence demonstrates the presence of Uyghur workers at Qingdao Tianyuan as recently as May 2023. The United Nations, human rights organizations and academic experts agree that since 2018, the Chinese government has systematically subjected Xinjiang’s predominantly Muslim ethnic minorities to forced labor across the country via state-sanctioned employment programs which use coercive methods in worker enrollment and obstruct freedom to terminate employment. The United Nations, human rights organizations and academic experts agree that since 2018, the Chinese government has systematically subjected Xinjiang’s predominantly Muslim ethnic minorities to forced labor across the country via state-sanctioned employment programs which use coercive methods in worker enrollment and obstruct freedom to terminate employment. Could you confirm whether white fish sourced from Yantai Sanko, Yantai Longwin and Qingdao Tianyuan has been used in any of the Findus branded products sold by Ahorramas since 2018? Does Ahorramas have any comment or clarification to make regarding the above information?"