Correspondence
Email sent to two contact addresses for Rizhao Jia Tian Xia Foods Co. Ltd.
The email said that Shandong Meijia Group has received persons from the Xinjiang region of China under a state-imposed labor transfer program, as recently as May 2023. The email asked the company, which is a Meijia Group company, to confirm or deny if it has employed Uyghurs at the plant in the past five years.
Rizhao Jia Tian Xia Foods replied: "We are very shocked to receive this message. After verifying, our company does not have a phenomenon of unlawfully using workers from Xinjiang. Please make note of our reply above. Thank you!"
The Outlaw Ocean Project replied: "To clarify and reiterate: when we discuss these matters publicly, we are citing the existence of the government's transfer of workers from Xinjiang into key processing plants. U.S. law cites any such workers in a product’s supply chain as part of state-sponsored forced labor (even if the Chinese general public and law see it otherwise). The United Nations also holds the view that these transfers may constitute forced labor. If there is anything else you'd like to offer in response to our findings, please do let us know."
The company replied: "After repeated checks and confirmations by the company's human resources department, our company currently does not have any employees from Xinjiang."