USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) said that the Smithfield Foods plant at Tar Heel, North Carolina, and the Rava Forwarding facility in Laredo, Texas, have been delisted as plants eligible to ship products to Mexico.
FSIS said the Smithfield facility was delisted June 16 relative to slaughter, boning, cut up, grinding, and processing pork, while the Rava Forwarding cold storage facility was delisted June 18. The facility is listed as cold storage for beef, poultry, pork, bison, sheep and wild game.
The Smithfield situation involved Mexican concerns over quality of a specific lot of hog skins sold to a third-party company that were eventually exported to Mexico, according to Keira Lombardo, Smithfield chief administrative officer. "We have conducted a thorough internal inquiry and have determined that the issue originates with the third-party company, not with Smithfield nor the facility," Lombardo said.
Reuters reported that Mexico's health safety agency Senasica was reviewing the matter.