At least four more Indian states banned the sale of Nestlé instant noodles Thursday after food-safety inspectors in New Delhi said they found dangerously-high amounts of lead in the product.
Food-safety officials in the western state of Gujarat said they were stopping the sales of Nestlé’s Maggi 2-Minute noodles after about half of the 27 noodle packets they tested contained the toxic metal. Officials in the southern state of Tamil Nadu said their tests found nearly twice the permissible amount of lead in some samples of the product. Authorities in the northern state of Jammu and Kashmir also imposed a ban amid growing concerns about the popular snack. They said they were still waiting for the results of their own tests.
Officials in the northern state of Uttarakhand said they were banning the sale of the noodles after their tests detected the presence of monosodium glutamate, which was not listed in the ingredients. While India doesn’t prohibit MSG, it requires manufacturers to label products that have it.
Tamil Nadu said it was halting sales for three months. The other three states said they would conduct more tests in July to decide whether to allow the product back on the market.
Food-safety departments in at least three other states said their tests did not detect lead or MSG. Nestlé’s Indian arm said it had conducted its own tests and found lead content to be within the allowed limits. It said it does not add MSG to its noodles.
“We use raw materials in Maggi noodles which can contain naturally-occurring glutamate,” Nestlé India Ltd. said in a statement.
A Nestlé SA spokeswoman in Switzerland said Thursday that the company was working with Indian authorities to better understand their test results.
“We are sharing our own test results, which show Maggi noodles to be completely safe, explaining our own testing methodologies and trying to understand the discrepancy between their test results and ours,” she said in an email.
Heighted concern over the safety of Nestle noodles across India was triggered after food inspectors in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh filed a criminal complaint last month, alleging they found seven times the permissible level of lead during a routine examination.
Allegations against the company come at a time when Nestlé and other consumer product companies are struggling with weak sales growth in the world’s second-most populous country.
Shares of its Indian arm tumbled to a six-month low Thursday. At least three Indian brokerages advised clients to sell the stocks Thursday, fearing the food-safety scare would erode sales. Analysts say Maggi noodles account for about a fifth of Nestlé’s sales in India.
India’s biggest supermarket chain, Big Bazaar, said it had halted sales of the noodles. Walmart Stores Inc. said Thursday that it had also decided to pull the noodles off the shelves of its 20 wholesale outlets in India.
India’s national food-safety watchdog said it would wait for test results from other states before deciding on a nationwide ban. It expects to receive results from most other states by early next week.
