Almost 200 tonnes of 1980s Swedish canned meat has found its way into Polish schools, nursing homes and grocery stores.
The conserved meat was produced as early as the 1980s for long-term storage purposes during the Cold War and was not meant to find its way to any European Union member state for retail sale or human consumption. The Swedish Agricultural Ministry claims that the sales contract stipulates that the cans of beef and pork are meant for animal feed only.
TVN24 reports that, over the last three years, hundreds of thousands of cans of the Swedish-produced meat have been sold in Poland and been turned into popular dishes such as pierogi (dumplings), stuffed cabbage, sausage, head cheese and more.
The Swedish government attempted to sell the meat in 1999. It was purchased by a Swedish distributor and, in 2007, a contract was signed with a Polish distributor registered in Krakow, southern Poland, to purchase 100,000 cans that amounted to 185 tonnes of ground meat.
Representatives of the Swedish Agriculture Ministry see nothing wrong with 26-year-old meat finding its way onto Polish tables.
“The sales contract includes a clause prohibiting the sale of meat for human consumption in EU countries. The reason was not health-related, but rather the potential influence on market prices,” stated Joakim Holmdahl, director of the foreign affairs department at Sweden’s agricultural ministry. Holmdahl added that the canned meat was not for humans.
The canned meat was preserved using the lyophilisation method in which a product is dried, frozen, then warmed in a vacuum so the product sublimes – a method that preserves taste, smell and, theoretically, vitamin and mineral content. The process is not reliable for products with a heavy fat content.
“The fat in these cans is completely spoiled. By eating this meat, one could poison oneself,” maintain scientists from the laboratory responsible for testing the canned meat at the Agricultural University of Crakow.
