Front-Line Employee's Role in Food Defense

Fear/closure/job loss

In 1989, millions of tons of fruit from Chile became suspect when a call was made to the U.S. Embassy in Santiago reporting that Chilean grapes had been intentionally adulterated with cyanide. The FDA banned the import of Chilean fruit and warned people not to eat grapes or Chilean fruit after investigators found traces of cyanide in two seedless red grapes shipped from Chile to Philadelphia.

At that time, seasonable fruit and vegetable export were second in importance only to copper to the Chilean national economy. In the U.S., the estimated value of the 45 million crates of nectarines, plums, peaches, apples, pears, raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, and table grapes that faced destruction was approximately $50 million.

U.S. consumers became wary of Chilean fresh fruits following this incident, and the decrease in fruits from Chile being imported into the U.S. was devastating for the Chilean produce business. This event demonstrates how a single incident can affect the public's opinion impacting consumer confidence, harming the product brand and/or country of origin, and ultimately causing a loss of jobs.

 

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