Sales of well-known milk brand Bright Dairy have been dropping in Shenzhen after production scandals involving its Zhengzhou and Hangzhou branches were exposed last week.

Bright Dairy products in Shenzhen markets, however, are not from the scandal affected branches, according to salespeople working for the dairy company.

Bright Dairy representatives say its milk in Shenzhen's major supermarkets such as Carrefour and Vanguard comes from Shanghai, the headquarters of Bright Dairy & Food Co.

"So many rumors arise in this business everyday. Last month it was the Nestle, and now it's our turn. The truth will be out very soon," said a Bright Diary's sales girl at Carrefour on Sunday, who confessed the sales had declined during the weekend. The supermarket is offering 12 percent discount for Bright Diary's extra-rich milk.

A TV station at Zhengzhou, capital of Henan Province, reported last week the Bright Dairy Zhengzhou branch used expired milk to make dairy products. The TV program even showed milk with maggots, saying it would be reused.

In a later inspection by the food quality watchdog in Zhejiang Province, Bright Dairy's Hangzhou branch was found to have next Sunday's date of production label on Thursday's products.

The management of Bright Dairy last Wednesday said its Zhengzhou branch did not use expired milk, insisting that the expired milk was destroyed. But the company admitted problems in the branch, saying that it should not have put products in open air.

The company did not comment on the Hangzhou incident.

In an online survey by sina.com.cn, about 78 percent of the surveyed said they didn't believe Bright Diary's announcement. Over 80 percent said they wouldn't buy Bright Diary's milk.

As one of China's largest diary producers, Bright Dairy has a 500,000-ton yearly production capacity. Its sales volume in 2003 was about 5.981 billion million yuan (US$723 million).

(Shenzhen Daily June 13, 2005)