National
All clear for the Sunflower Oil on sale in Spain from today
By h.b.
Apr 28, 2008 - 7:26 AM

The Spanish Minister for Health, Bernat Soria, said last night that the order not to use sunflower oil has been lifted and that all brands of the oil which will be back on sale in Spain on Monday morning would be fine. He said that such brands had not been distributed from the Ukraine.

French company Saipol has been named as the importer of 2,600 tons of the sunflower oil contaminated with hydrocarbons. 125 tons of that came into Spain where there is still great sensitivity to oil following the corrupted rape seed oil scandal which resulted in the death of as many as 160 people across the country in 1981.

The Ministry for Health in Spain had ordered the withdrawal from sale of sunflower oil across the country on Friday. It came as part of a European alert after hydrocarbons were found in batches of the oil from the Ukraine.

The problem was first detected in France, and the risk of contamination is said to be ‘minimal’ but even so the Health Department has withdrawn the oil from sale and said that people should not use the sunflower oil they have at home until it is known which brands could be affected.

The source of the problem was Ilyichevsk in the Ukraine where the sunflower oil was mixed with cheaper mineral oils, or placed in tanks used previously for hydrocarbons, before being shipped on some six boats to France, Spain, Italy and Holland. The oil could be have been used also by other manufacturers, of sauce for example.