The Food, Agriculture and Livestock Ministry revealed unbelievable food scams, ranging from toasted sandwiches made with donkey meat and meatballs with gizzards to sausages containing salivary glands. Butchers say that they feel at ease about food scams revealed during ministry control checks. "Small business owners cannot pull off these kinds of scams because if they try, then their local customers stop buying from them. Those who try to run a food scam will disappear in the system. However, medium- and large-sized factories should be checked for such scams," say butchers. "We sell products in their pure state, and what happens after that, happens elsewhere."
An expert drew attention to chicken gizzards used in pastries, meatball mixes, sausages and salamis. Saying that it is hard to find gizzards at poulterers, the expert added: "Ask 100 poulterers and you may find gizzards at 10 of them at most. Big factories buy gizzards before they are delivered to poulterers. Or poulterers take the gizzards out of chickens and sell them to big factories. Gizzards are used in up to 50 percent of products, as we often hear. Small- and medium-sized enterprises and small businesses are being victimized here." Butchers complain about the lack of an independent inspection system, and many talk about incidents of "receiving license by bribery," which clearly happens before their eyes. They claim that some big companies receive clean documents by using their own inspectors and veterinaries. "Independent inspectors need to go door to door. You have no idea about the food scams running in the markets," they say. A gizzard is a stomach muscle located in the alimentary canal of a bird used for grinding food. It is hard because of its muscular structure. It has been revealed during inspections that gizzards are used frequently in meats and sausages. Another food scam involves the color of chickens. Chickens are dyed yellow so they can be sold as organic chickens. When customers wash the chickens under water, all the yellow color washes off.
