Embattled French dairy chief breaks silence over salmonella scare

The chief executive of Frances Lactalis group on Sunday vowed compensation for victims of salmonella-tainted baby milk as he revealed that recalls were now under way in 83 countries.

Giving his first interview in nearly 20 years, Emmanuel Besnier who heads the family-controlled company, told the Journal du Dimanche newspaper that the recall involved more than 12 million packages of Picot, Milumel, Celia and other brands of powdered baby milk.

"We are going to draw the lessons from this crisis and set out an even stricter hygiene framework, in collaboration with the authorities," he said.

Asked why he had not publicly addressed parents' concerns as worries about the outbreak intensified, Besnier said: "It's true, by nature I'm not very forthcoming."

"In a crisis like this, we act first, and perhaps I didn't take the necessary time to explain things."

A total of 37 babies have fallen ill in France, health authorities said late Friday, along with a case in Spain and a suspected case in Greece, but Besnier said no new cases had been reported since December 8, a week after the recall was announced.

"The case in Spain goes back to October," he added, referring to the two cases outside France reported Friday by the Eurosurveillance medical journal.

Besnier's interview included two of the first public photographs of the secretive leader in years, at the Lactalis headquarters in Laval, western France.

It came after finance minister Bruno Le Maire summoned Besnier to a meeting over the crisis Friday, in which the chief executive agreed to pull from store and pharmacy shelves all products from the Craon factory where the outbreak was found, instead of those dating back to February.

But Besnier did not appear with Le Maire at a press conference after the meeting, despite calls by several government officials for him to face the public.

'Not hiding things'

Hundreds of lawsuits have been filed against the group by families who say their children got salmonella poisoning after drinking powdered milk made by the company.

But Besnier, 47, denied claims by an association of victims' families that Lactalis had lied about the dates and number of stocks affected by the salmonella outbreak.

"This is false. I don't know what this claim is based on," he said.

"At no point was there any intention of hiding things."

Besnier defended, however, not informing the authorities that internal tests had discovered salmonella on a broom and on the tiles of a dehydration tower at the Craon factory in August and November last year.

"For us, these 'environment' tests are an alert to make sure we keep the bacteria far from the product," he said, adding that authorities would have been alerted only if bacteria were found in the powdered milk.

Created in 1933 by Besnier's grandfather, Lactalis has become an industry behemoth with annual sales of some 17 billion euros ($20.6 billion), making it the world's third-largest dairy group, behind Danone and Nestle.

The salmonella scare has cast a harsh spotlight on an executive and a company little known to the public, despite employing 15,000 people in France, where milk and cheese are proudly considered part of the country's heritage.

Analysts say the crisis could dent the company's reputation among anxious parents worldwide.

"This recall may undermine consumer trust in milk formula brands produced using milk from French farms in the emerging markets affected by the recall, which includes China," said Raphael Moreau, a senior analyst at Euromonitor.