Global fast food chains McDonald’s and KFC find themselves caught once again in a serious PR crisis after a local meat supplier, Shanghai Husi Food Co, was accused of supplying rotting meat to the fast-food chains.
Given previous incidents regarding food-safety in China, gaining back trust will prove difficult.
"The confidence of the Chinese public in food safety has been so shaken to its core, consumers have lost count how many times products have been tainted or contaminated," Bob Pickard, APAC chairman of Huntsworth told PRWeek.
"Their doubts about the assurances which companies provide them about safety were already pervasive, and now trust has become almost non-existent. Any company communicating in this environment of universal skepticism must assume that few will believe what they say, and therefore that only sincere actions sustained over time will be perceived as real."