Leftover chicken piled in a crate inside a slaughterhouse in Terbol. (Screenshot from a video received by our correspondent in the Bekaa, Sarah Abdallah)
The Litani National Office announced Tuesday the arrest of six employees at a slaughterhouse in Terbol, the Bekaa, after a sanitary scandal was uncovered when large quantities of chicken scraps were found piled up inside the facility and intended to be transformed into agglomerated blocks of poultry meat.
During an inspection of the slaughterhouse, a special joint committee formed by the Ministry of Industry and the Litani National Office revealed "serious violations of hygiene and public safety standards," according to a statement released by the Office.
"Large quantities of chicken scraps (bones, necks, skins and trimmings) were discovered piled up inside the slaughterhouse. These residues were ground and mixed using a special machine, then transformed into agglomerated blocks of poultry meat, in conditions that did not meet the minimum sanitary and food standards," the statement continued.
Acting on instructions from the public prosecutor at the Court of Appeal, six slaughterhouse employees were arrested, the Litani Office said in a separate statement. "Following the expanded investigations, it appeared that the bone and skin powder produced in the facility was resold to certain mortadella factories in the Chtoura region," the statement added.
Contacted by L’Orient-Le Jour, Litani Office director Sami Alawieh indicated that "more than a dozen complaints had already been filed in the past against this slaughterhouse, which was operating without a license," specifying that criminal proceedings are underway against its owner. "All this is part of the monitoring of rejected products, to check whether they are being dumped in the river," he added. He hinted that the facility "enjoys protection," without delving into details.
During the inspection, "slaughterhouse officials turned off the generators to hinder the documentation process, forcing the team to use their phone flashlights to take pictures documenting the extent of violations," the Office added.
Later that day, the Terbol municipality disposed of quantities of spoiled chicken seized by the Litani National Office, according to the National News Agency (NNA). A three-meter-deep pit was dug to bury nearly 800 kilograms of meat unfit for consumption, which was then covered with lime before the pit was completely closed. The operation was carried out in accordance with health and environmental standards and was conducted on the orders of the public prosecutor's office, under the supervision of the Ministry of Public Health.
The Terbol municipality, for its part, affirmed its commitment to food safety and its respect for the environment. The town is located in one of the richest agricultural plains of the Bekaa, producing thousands of tons of healthy crops each year.
This is not the first time a slaughterhouse in this Bekaa has been singled out. In 2018, a facility in Terbol was closed by authorities for operating without a license. Of the 22 employees working there at the time, only eight had valid health certificates.
A study carried out in 2024 by the World Health Organization's (WHO) Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean confirmed the existence of sub-optimal food safety practices among nearly half the sample analyzed in Lebanon.
The WHO highlights the importance of public health interventions and educational programs to strengthen knowledge and promote better food handling practices to reduce the risk of foodborne illnesses.
At the national level, WHO considers it urgent to improve infrastructure to ensure adequate access to safe and healthy food in order to meet the growing needs of the population in this context of multiple crises and political instability.
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