WSJournal. (horse as meat story) IKEA's Iconic Meatball Drawn Into Horse-Meat Scandal

IKEA temporarily stopped selling meatballs at some of its European stores after inspectors discovered traces of horse meat in the furniture giant's signature food item. Dr. Richard Fielding, a professor at the University of Hong Kong's school of public health, talks about how the case shines a light on the problems of global food production.

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STOCKHOLM—IKEA's store on the outskirts of Sweden's biggest city teemed with the usual swell of activity Monday evening, as shoppers snapped up everything from AA-size batteries to flat-pack bookcases and sofas.

But one iconic product was absent: the meatballs.

The Swedish furniture giant was drawn into Europe's growing food-safety scandal after food inspectors in the Czech Republic found traces of horse meat in a batch of IKEA's signature food item.

While the scandal has been raging in Europe for weeks, many of the tainted products were relatively obscure. Not so for the IKEA meatball—an estimated 150 million of which are consumed around the world.

IKEA relies on food sales for 5% of its €27 billion ($35.6 billion) in revenue.

The store in Stockholm, for instance, features several cafeterias that typically have meatballs on the menu.

On Monday, however, signs that traditionally advertise those dishes had been removed and the main menu item was a beef with cream sauce and potatoes.

Bags of frozen meatballs in the grocery section near the checkout lanes had been cleared out, and meatballs made of chicken meat, priced at 39 Swedish kronor ($6.08), were available.

At the restaurant, some patrons joked with servers, while other shoppers avoided the cafeteria, saying the disclosure of horse meat was "horrifying."

IKEA spokeswoman Ylva Magnusson said the company is conducting its own tests of the meatballs, and that most of IKEA's meatballs sold in Europe are produced by a single Swedish supplier, Familjen Dafgård.

The only exceptions are Norway, Russia, Switzerland and Poland, where meatballs are made by local suppliers and will remain available at IKEA stores in those regions, Ms. Magnusson said.

"We hope that by taking decisive action, we can show our customers that we take their concerns seriously," she said. "It's important that our customers feel safe, and if they have concerns they should contact us."

Ms. Magnusson said none of the products are harmful to eat. "This is about what it says on the label being correct."

IKEA's meatballs are said to contain pork and beef.

IKEA is estimated to serve 150 million meatballs per year, according to a company website.

While the fascination with Swedish meatballs predates the 70-year-old company, IKEA's take on the traditional cuisine has been a mainstay in many households and its appeal has stretched well beyond Europe.

Last year, for instance, IKEA touched off a controversy in Singapore when it changed its meatball recipe to make the product softer, according to Makansutra, an Asian food culture blog. IKEA tweaked the recipe again after some threatened to stop visiting the store.

Megan Söderholm-Nash, a 40-year-old Swedish-American psychotherapist working in Germany, said IKEA's meatball issue brings the horse-meat scandal closer to home.

"I am more trusting of Swedish companies and it makes me wonder about corporate integrity in a way I never have questioned Swedes before," she said.

The scandal first erupted last month after Irish authorities tested suspiciously cheap frozen beef patties and discovered they contained horse DNA.

It has since swept across Europe, prompting supermarkets in numerous countries to pull processed meat products from their shelves.

The furor has raised concerns about the complex network of slaughterhouses and suppliers that handle food on its way to the dinner table, and the controls governing cross-border transportation of food.

The matter has already implicated some of the biggest food companies and meat producers in Europe, including Switzerland-based Nestlé SA, the largest food company by revenue, and Ireland's ABP Food Group's Silvercrest Foods.

At a meeting of farm ministers in Brussels after the IKEA discovery came to light, officials said they will work harder to coordinate investigations related to horse meat. Horse meat often costs less than a quarter the price of beef.

"In terms of preventing fraud, we will have to mainstream in some way across the [European Union] the use of DNA testing to establish and confirm for consumers that what they think they are eating is actually what they are eating," Irish farm minister Simon Coveney said.

Farm ministers agreed to send information produced from national investigations into the horse-meat scandal to Europol, the police-coordinating body in The Hague that supports multinational criminal investigations.

"It's quite clear we're faced with a Europe-wide criminal activity," said British farm minister Owen Paterson.