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 a company engaged in such practices and your supply chain.
Yantai Sanko Fisheries Co. Ltd., which supplies seafood products, including yellowfin sole and Pacific rockfish, to Valio Food GmbH’s Aqua Queen brand, has received persons from the Xinjiang region of China under a state-imposed labor transfer program as recently as 2022.
The United Nations, human rights organizations and academic experts agree that since 2018, the Chi…
We refer to your media query from Thursday, 22 June 2023 concerning the Chinese company Yantai Sanko Fisheries Co. Ltd which is suspected to be involved in forced labor. The query states that there is a link between this company and Valio as well as a link between Valio and McDonald’s.
In September 2019 and December 2020, Valio Food GmbH, which is a 100% subsidiary of Valio Hamburg group, received two deliveries of Frozen MSC Redfish fillet, which was produced at Yantai Sanko Fisheries Co. Ltd via a Chinese broker company. The deliveries are not related to our brand called Aqua Queen at all.…
Thank you very much for responding to our query and for sending Oliver’s detailed statement to us, we really appreciate Valio's engagement and transparency on this issue. Valio Food has shared photos on social media of Aqua Queen-branded yellowfin sole products - the label says ‘Pazifisches Scholleneinzelfilet (Lat. Limanda aspera)’ - with Yantai Sanko’s plant code on the packaging. We have also found similarly-packaged Aqua Queen ‘Rotbarschfilet (Lat. Sebastes alutus)’ bearing Yantai Sanko’s plant code. Were these Pazifisches Scholleneinzelfilet and Rotbarschfilet products part of the same sh…
As stated earlier, we stand for our values of responsible and ethical treatment of people, animals and our environment along the entire supply chain and strictly condemn any violation of human rights.
Thank you for reminding us of our social media posts back in 2020. We did not comment on the yellowfin sole earlier to you as this product is named in a different way internally (pacific plaice). The Latin name (Lat. Limanda aspera) you mentioned clarifies this point.
We traced back all our documents from the only two shipments we have received in 2019 and 2020 produced by Yantai Sanko. The shi…
Thank you for your continued engagement and transparency in relation to our investigation. We have evidence of Uyghur labor at Yantai Sanko as recently as 2022, but the earliest evidence we have uncovered actually dates back to early 2019. Oliver mentioned in his statement that at the time of the aforementioned deliveries to Valio, Yantai Sanko Fisheries Co. Ltd. was certified according to the SMETA 4 Pillar by Bureau Veritas. Could you share a copy of the relevant Bureau Veritas audit report with us?
Thank you for providing the additional information. We don’t have the full SMETA audit report available, only the corrective action plan report. As this report is a third party document and not related to us at Valio at all, we would suggest you to contact Bureau Veritas or SMETA directly. Please find below an extract from the SEDEX platform, where you can see the registration number of Yanti Sanko. The SMETA audit was conducted from 5th-7th August 2019. ████ is named as Bureau Veritas Auditor. We hope that this information will help you in your ongoing investigation.