Spent fowl classification being used to illegally ship US chicken meat to Canada

OTTAWA – Chicken meat imports from the US are again being fraudulently declared as spent fowl to avoid duties, which displaces Canadian production, costs Canada millions of dollars and puts consumers are risk due to broken food chain traceability, says Chicken Farmers of Canada.

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When the productivity of old laying hens declines, they are processed for their meat, while broiler chickens are raised for meat consumption, CFC said. Unlike other chicken imports, there is no limit on how much spent fowl can be imported. As has happened in the past, meat from broiler chickens is being imported labeled as spent fowl. “If there were to be a chicken meat-related food safety recall in the US, broiler meat imported from there that was purposely mislabeled would not be captured by the CFIA’s recall efforts and could result in cases of serious illness in Canada.”

In 2012, Canada imported more spent fowl breast meat than was actually produced in the entire US and in 2020, Canada imported the equivalent of 77 per cent of the US’s entire spent fowl production despite the fact that the US exports spent fowl to other countries and that there is also a substantial American domestic demand for spent fowl meat, CFC said. “Clearly something is friends.”

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Alastaire MacGregor, the NDP agriculture critic, raised the issue during a meeting of the Commons agriculture committee saying the duty-free status of spent chicken means, “some importers may intentionally declare broiler chicken meat as spent fowl. The imports of spent fowl can be difficult to detect, especially if imported in the form of deboned chicken breasts.”

Agriculture Minister Lawrence MacAulay said the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) has discussed the fraudulent mis-declaration of broiler meat as spent fowl on several occasions and “continues to collaborate with our international counterparts and trading partners to find the proper mechanisms and tools to address this issue.”

In July 2017 and in May 2020, the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) launched verifications of a total of 120 companies importing spent fowl and identified 46 of them that had misclassified goods. It assessed $250,520,359 in duties and penalties for non-compliance. Further enforcement results from the CBSA’s most recent verification, conducted in September 2023, are pending. It also works closely with the United States Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service to control the misrepresentation of meat imports through existing import requirements, MacAulay said.

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CFC said Canada imports both broiler and spent fowl meat. “Realizing that it is impossible to visually distinguish between the two products, some importers have been purposely mislabeling broiler chicken meat as spent fowl in order to circumvent import controls. When the situation first became apparent in 2012, Canada was importing the equivalent of 101 per cent of the United States’ entire spent fowl production. This is of course impossible and can only be explained by import fraud.”

The proportion of Canadian imports to US production remains unrealistically high. A decrease in 2021 was temporary and resulted from shortages in US chicken market due to the pandemic. Canadian imports now represent 78 per cent of US production even though according to US data, their main export market is Mexico.”

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“Based on our estimates, any imports above 60 million kilograms deserve close scrutiny. Current estimates are that 32 per cent of Canada’s spent fowl imports are actually mislabeled broiler meat. At the height of the illegal imports, Canada lost 1,400 jobs, $105 million in contributions to the economy, $35 million in taxes and at least $66 million in government revenues per year due to tariff evasion.”

In 2014, with financial support from CFC, Trent University successfully developed a forensic DNA test that can verify whether a given product contains verification for spent fowl meat. This would prevent fraudulent imports, while creating job6, and reinforcing the safety of the Canadian food system.

“In order to put an end to ongoing import fraud and ensure this activity does not take place in the future, the Government of Canada must incorporate the DNA test as a means of import.”

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The US Fowl Council is supportive of measures that prevent the mislabeling of broiler meat as spent fowl its members also stand to lose from these illegal practices.

Robert Ianiro, CFIA’s Vice-President of Policy and Programs, said the Trent test “has demonstrated some merits but requires some additional refinements before we are able to consider it for regulatory testing perspectives and purposes. We’re aware of it, and if this is an additional tool that we can use to detect fraudulent and misrepresented, in this case, spent fowl that’s being passed off as chicken at the border, we’ll surely consider putting additional measures in place . I’ll also indicate that we’re continuing to work with our colleagues at Canada Border Services Agency to prioritize these types of shipments–that’s already in place–and are working with our colleagues at the USDA on this issue.”

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