Taiwanese restaurants and hotel chains said that they are under pressure to raise prices to reflect expected increases in the price of locally produced pork amid health concerns about pork containing traces of ractopamine.
However, there are also concerns that doing so could scare away potential customers.
A policy allowing imports of US pork containing the animal feed additive came into effect on Friday. Local producers are not allowed to use ractopamine.
Photo: CNA
Several major restaurant chains in Taiwan, such as Wowprime Corp (王品), Tai Tong Food & Beverage Group (TTFB, 瓦城泰統集團), Hi-Lai Foods Co (漢來美食), Bafang Yunji International Co (八方雲集) and Tofu Restaurant Co (豆府), as well as Formosa International Hotels Corp (晶華國際酒店集團) and LDC Hotels & Resorts Group (雲朗觀光集團), said they are using only pork produced in Taiwan or pork from countries that do not use ractopamine.
For example, Bafang Yunji, which operates 1,000 dumpling restaurants across Taiwan, said that it only uses Taiwanese pork at its outlets in central and southern Taiwan.
Its northern Taiwan stores mainly use locally produced pork, but have imported a “small amount” of ractopamine-free pork from Denmark.
Meanwhile, Wowprime, which operates 21 restaurant brands with a total of 280 stores nationwide, said that most of its pork is from Taiwan, although it has also imported some from Denmark, as well as lard from Japan.
TTFB said that none of its restaurants use US pork products and clearly label the country of origin in accordance with government regulations.
However, several restaurant and hotel chain operators said they might be forced to raise their prices soon, as many Taiwanese pork vendors are planning to raise their prices because the new policy is expected to boost demand for locally produced pork.
A restaurant chain operator, who asked to remain anonymous, said that although most imported pork does not contain ractopamine, almost all restaurants believe the only way to convince customers of the safety of their products is to use only Taiwanese pork.
This would lead to significantly higher domestic pork prices and increase restaurants’ costs, but they are reluctant to increase prices as that would affect their businesses, the operator said.
“We are caught in a dilemma,” they added.
Another senior manager at a restaurant chain said that despite the central government’s policy, many local governments continue to ban ractopamine.
The manager, who also asked to remain anonymous, called on the government to come up with a single nationwide standard regarding the use of ractopamine so that restaurant operators would have clear guidelines to follow.
Ractopamine is banned in the EU and China because of concerns over safety for both animals and humans. The US allows the use of ractopamine, and had said that Taiwan’s zero-tolerance policy impeded trade.
Since the new policy was announced on Aug. 28, a number of local governments have said that they would continue to ban ractopamine in pork.
However, the Cabinet has said that local government bans have no validity.
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