MCDONALD’S and KFC in China faced a new food safety scare yesterday after a Shanghai TV station reported a supplier sold them expired beef and chicken.

    The companies said they immediately stopped using meat from the company, Husi Food Co. Ltd. Shanghai authorities said they ordered the supplier to suspend operations Sunday and are investigating.

    The fast-food giants’ Shenzhen offices said yesterday that local stores did not use the Shanghai supplier.

    Shenzhen’s food safety watchdog said it has begun to test foods sold at the franchises and will make results public as soon as possible.

    Dragon TV said Sunday that Husi, owned by OSI Group of Aurora, Illinois, the United States, repackaged stale beef and chicken and put new expiration dates on them. It said they were sold to McDonald’s, KFC and Pizza Hut restaurants.

    McDonald’s Corp. and Yum Brands Inc., which owns KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell, apologized to Chinese consumers yesterday and said in separate statements they were conducting their own investigations.

    “Food safety is a top priority for McDonald’s,” the company said on its microblog account. The company said it pursues “strict compliance” with consumer safety laws and regulations and has “zero tolerance for illegal behavior.”

    A third company, fast-food chain Dicos, said in a statement it stopped using sausage patties supplied by Husi. Dicos is owned by Taiwan’s Ting Hsin International Group and the company website said it had 2,000 outlets in China as of September 2013.

    KFC is China’s biggest restaurant chain, with more than 4,000 outlets and plans to open 700 more this year.

    The company was badly hurt after State television reported in December 2013 that some poultry suppliers violated rules on drug use in chickens. Yum said KFC sales in China plunged 37 percent the following month. KFC launched an effort to tighten control over product quality and eliminated more than 1,000 small poultry producers from its supply network.(SD-Agencies)