The snail meat you eat may be risky! A secret visit to the golden apple snail industry chain

Frozen golden apple snail meat displayed by snail vendors near Heping Bridge in Hanshou County. All photos in this article, except those with special marks, were taken by The Paper reporter Xia Ruchu.

In a processing plant in Huanglushan Village, Yanwanghu Town, Hanshou County, Hunan Province, the factory building built with colored steel tiles is filled with a fishy smell. Several female workers sit around and quickly sift through piles of snail meat on the table, some of which still have pink soft pieces. The workers shovel the sieved snail meat into plastic baskets, weigh them, and then send them to the cold storage, waiting for the manufacturer's truck to take them away in boxes.

"We have as many apple snails as you want. Ten tons, twenty tons, whatever you want." The person in charge of the processing plant said that the number of field snails has decreased in recent years, while the number of apple snails in wild waters has increased. Apple snails with shells are easy to spot. In recent years, they have mainly sold frozen apple snail meat that has been shelled, with annual sales of several hundred tons, mainly to some restaurants and pre-prepared food factories.

Some of the snail meat skewers sold at a spicy hot pot restaurant on Shuixing Street in Changde City are recognizable as golden apple snails.

In early June, The Paper conducted undercover investigations in Hunan, Chongqing and other places and found that the price of golden apple snails caught from the wild is extremely low, several times the price of field snails and ring-edge snails. Most of them are shelled and "disguised" as field snail meat and then enter the market. After being peeled, screened, stringed or cooked, they are difficult to distinguish.

The golden apple snail is an alien species with a strong reproductive capacity and is destructive to the ecological environment. In addition, the golden apple snail may contain potential risks such as parasites, heavy metals, and new pollutants, which may cause irreversible harm to the human body. In recent years, disease control departments in many places have called for people not to eat golden apple snails. If they are to be eaten, they must be cooked thoroughly.

Even processed Pomacea canaliculata meat is not unrecognizable. According to several authoritative anatomical research papers and anonymous experts, the most significant difference is that the Pomacea canaliculata has a larger mouth, a flat and short vertebral tail, a pair of forked labial whiskers at the front of the head, "similar to antennae", and a pair of slender antennae on both sides. The mature eggs are pink to bright red, and after being excreted from the body, they stick together to form an oval block. The mouth of the field snail is relatively small, and the vertebral tail is long and pointed. There are no labial whiskers, only a pair of antennae. The eggs are transparent and not easy to see.

Hanshou County is located in the northwest of Hunan Province, on the west bank of Dongting Lake, at the tail of the Yuan and Li rivers, and is rich in water resources. The local Huamulan Vegetable Wholesale Market and the surrounding streets are home to many aquatic product merchants.

Li Sheng's stall specializes in selling freshwater snails such as field snails and stone snails. "There are golden apple snails, but it's troublesome and I don't want to buy them," Li Sheng said. No one raises golden apple snails, they are all caught in the wild, and there are large quantities. He can find someone to buy them, but he only sells fresh ones with shells, does not provide test reports, does not include shipping costs, and costs more than 1 yuan per catty.

"That thing cannot be eaten, it's unhygienic, and it's strictly inspected." Li Sheng said that the processing factory of the golden apple snail is hidden in the countryside and ordinary people can't find it, and it is not sold to unfamiliar retail investors. "They all use vans and trailers weighing dozens of tons to transport the goods." It smells very bad during processing and does not meet environmental standards. Therefore, the local authorities are strict and do not allow factories to be opened.

At the Golden Apple Snail processing factory in Huanglushan Village, Yanwanghu Town, the processed Golden Apple Snail meat is framed and placed in a cold storage.

Li Sheng bent down and picked one out of the pile of snails, spreading it in his palm. "The processing plant buys them through dealers. We sell dead ones like this to those who buy golden apple snails. Do you understand?"

Zhang Jun is a famous snail dealer in the Heping Bridge area of ​​Hanshou County, more than ten kilometers away. Zhang Jun said that within a hundred kilometers, he and a few partners are the only ones doing the snail wholesale business. "No matter where they come from, I will buy them as long as they are available," he said.

At the apple snail processing factory in Huanglushan Village, Yanwanghu Town, female workers quickly sift through piles of apple snail meat on the table.

Zhang Jun opened a small supermarket at the intersection, mainly selling cigarettes and alcohol. Outside the store, there are scales, small roller screening machines, and piles of boxes, plastic baskets and snakeskin bags filled with snails, which looks like a fresh food stall.

At Zhang Jun's shop, the shelled golden apple snails are sold for 0.5 yuan per pound, with logistics and processing fees not included. The roughly processed golden apple snail meat is sold for 4 yuan per pound. The standard delivery is 30 pounds per package, packed in snakeskin bags.

The price of snails is much more expensive, 3 yuan per catty with shells and 10 yuan per catty of frozen meat.

Ring-edged snails, which are often used as snails, are more expensive. Zhang Jun said that he only sells roughly processed ring-edged snails at 14 yuan per catty. Under a simple tent on one side of the store, nine female workers were sitting around picking snail meat, with mosquitoes and flies flying around. An elderly woman had several snail shells stuck to her hair.

There is an old cold storage in the corner outside the store, with snakeskin bags stacked inside and different kinds of frozen snail meat in dirty plastic baskets, piled up on the ground. "There are more than 100 tons in the storage," Zhang Jun picked up a large plate of frozen apple snail meat, some of which still had red ovary fragments, "as much as you want, 10 tons, 20 tons, whatever you want." Zhang Jun said that because the price of apple snails is too cheap, no one in the local area breeds them. They can be caught everywhere in rivers, ditches and ponds, all year round, but less in winter.

The supermarket is just a recycling station, and the real processing plant is in the village. Zhang Jun said that they process tens of thousands of pounds of golden apple snail meat a day, but the local environmental protection inspections have been strict in recent days, so "they stopped doing it." Seeing that the reporter insisted, Zhang Jun called his partner Zhao Mingming and drove a truck to take the reporter to the factory for a tour.

Driving along the rural roads, the reporter saw some ditch walls covered with pink egg masses. "These are the eggs of golden apple snails." Zhao Mingming said that they have been selling various freshwater snails for more than ten years. In recent years, the number of field snails has decreased, and the number of golden apple snails in wild waters has increased. Golden apple snails with shells are easy to spot because of their appearance. They mainly sell frozen meat of golden apple snails without shells, which is available all year round. "We can sell hundreds of tons a year."

The processing plant is located in Huanglushan Village, Yanwanghu Town, with a sign at the door that reads "Hanshou County Senxiang Breeding and Farming Professional Cooperative". Industrial and commercial information shows that members of the cooperative can engage in rice, lobster, and aquaculture; carry out planting and breeding technology exchanges and information consulting services. In July 2022, it was listed as operating abnormally by the Hanshou County Market Supervision Bureau.

The Paper noted that a signboard reading "Hanshou County Xiangyuan Special Aquatic Products Co., Ltd." was hung near the processing plant. The business scope includes: wholesale and retail of aquatic products.

At the apple snail processing factory in Huanglushan Village, Yanwanghu Town, workers are screening and weighing apple snail meat.

The processing plant was filled with a foul smell, and there were puddles of milky white sewage on the ground. Zhao Mingming followed the reporter closely. More than a dozen workers on the scene were local villagers. They were doing their own work and remained silent in response to the reporter's questions. Nine female workers were divided into two groups, sitting around and quickly sifting through the piles of snail meat on the table to remove impurities such as residual snail shells. People kept coming with full baskets of snail meat and dumping them on the table. The sieved snail meat was shoveled into plastic baskets, weighed according to the specification of 30 kilograms per basket, and then sent to several large cold storages deep in the processing plant. Zhao Mingming said that a worker can handle nearly 1,000 kilograms a day.

In a cold storage that the reporter entered, there were hundreds of baskets of frozen snail meat and some small-sized plastic-sealed clam meat. Zhao Mingming said that he could customize the same small-sized package of golden apple snail meat for the reporter, "a package of 200 grams, this kind of food is pre-prepared, and the price is a bit more expensive."

Zhao Mingming said that the snail meat on the scene was a mixture of field snails and golden apple snails. But based on the aforementioned biological characteristics, in fact almost all the snail meat on the scene was golden apple snails, of varying sizes, and some with pink ovary remnants. Some of these processed frozen snail meats are wholesaled to farmers' markets, but more of them are directly sent by downstream manufacturers to transport goods. "For example, manufacturers of pre-prepared dishes all come with whole trucks," Zhao Mingming said. Zhang Jun also mentioned that most of the manufacturers who come to transport goods are local manufacturers. "The ones in the skewers restaurant are all golden apple snails."

When the reporter asked for a third-party test report, Zhang Jun said that if he needed it, he could ask someone to issue it, but he would have to add a tax point. "We have been selling it for so many years and have never opened it, but we still sell it. But I know someone wants it, the food factory wants it, and a restaurant in Chengdu just asked me for it a few days ago."

He sent the reporter two recent test reports on parasites, metal residues and bacterial colonies. The samples were all named "large snail meat" and did not specify whether they were golden apple snail meat or field snail meat. The commissioning units were all "Hanshou County Xiangyuan Special Aquatic Products Processing Factory" - the same legal representative as the above two companies. The testing agencies were Guangdian Metrology Testing Co., Ltd. and Guangdian Metrology Testing Co., Ltd.

A partial screenshot of the inspection report provided by a snail meat vendor, showing the detection of Salmonella.

The report showed that nematode larvae, trematode metacercariae and tapeworm sparganosis were not detected. Salmonella, a common foodborne pathogen, was detected.

The reporter noticed that the packaging specifications on the inspection report were all 500g/bag, which was not the specifications of the goods seen on site. Regarding the question of whether the reports could be used interchangeably because the snail meat collected every day came from different sources, Zhang Jun only said that the reports were not falsified and that the two reports could be used directly if needed.

A farmer who sells freshwater snails at Sanjiao Bridge, Yanwang Lake, Hanshou County, also told The Paper that there are apple snails everywhere, and if they are needed, they can find someone to fish them out of the water. In the past few months, she sold hundreds of kilograms of shelled snails every day. "I can buy as many as I want. I don't work hard and don't buy freely." When the weather gets hot, she mainly sells frozen meat, and there are still dozens of kilograms of ready stock in the cold storage.

She said she could not provide the test report. "No one wants this. They just take the goods and run away. I don't know where they come from or what they do."

The Paper called several aquaculture farms in Hanshou County, Changde City, Chongqing Tongnan District, and Banan District, and they all said they had no snails, but some could provide golden apple snails. The head of a breeding base said they no longer sell snails and have switched to freshwater fish farming. A snail farmer said that snails are not easy to sell and "can't make money."

The small red oil pot is filled with various skewers, and many people sit around to eat. This "hearth-style" spicy hot pot is quite Hunan-style and can be seen everywhere in the local area, especially loved by young people.

There are many snacks on Mercury Street in Changde City, and many young people are eating at the Chuan Chuan Malatang restaurant on the back street of the University of Arts and Sciences.

Shuixing Street in Wuling District, Changde City, is full of snacks of all kinds. Thepaper.cn went to a local chain store called "Xiaobin Malatang" and found snail meat skewers in a red oil pot. They tasted fishy and the meat was a little rotten, but some of them were recognizable as golden apple snails. However, the staff said they were selling field snail meat. A senior staff member said that snail meat skewers have been sold since the store opened and are very popular. On busy days, hundreds of skewers can be sold a day, "a full pot". The reporter noticed that the outer packaging of the snail meat skewers in the store showed the "Master Guo" brand.

The back street of Changde University of Arts and Sciences is also a famous local food street. Reporters found that many spicy hotpot restaurants used snail meat skewers with golden apple snails, but the store clerks also said it was field snail meat. Many consumers present said frankly that they could not tell the difference between the two. Some consumers immediately searched for information about golden apple snails online after hearing about it.

"If you have any doubts, don't eat it. If you listen to what you hear online, you won't have any food to eat." A clerk at "Hougai Koukou Malatang" said that he had heard of the golden apple snail, but the store used "Guo Shifu" brand snail meat skewers, "which have been sold for many years and there has never been a problem."

When visiting Hanshou County and Changsha Mawangdui Seafood Wholesale Market, the reporter also found that many frozen products sold at wholesale were the same packaging and specifications of "Guo Shifu" snail meat skewers, with 25 skewers per package and a price of between 20 and 25 yuan. One wholesaler said frankly that he could not identify snail meat, "I don't know what kind of snail it is, but it's delicious anyway."

Industrial and commercial information shows that the "Master Guo" brand comes from Changsha Master Guo Food Co., Ltd., a well-known frozen food processing company established in 2006. It sells grilled and fried products such as chicken skewers, gluten skewers, and stinky tofu, which are sold throughout the country.

"Our product prices are high in the industry, and we have to guarantee the quality." The Paper went to the "Master Guo" brand office in Kaifu District, Changsha as a buyer. A marketing director surnamed Wu said that there are many golden apple snails on the market, and the company uses an "imported" snail. He did not say the name, only saying "it has nothing to do with golden apple snails." He also said that when placing an order, he could provide customs inspection reports for individual products.

Product information shows that the manufacturer of "Master Guo" snail skewers is "Hanshou County Hongtai Food Factory". The company was established in 2009, and its business scope includes the production and sale of baked goods and frozen foods. It has been punished by administrative and environmental protection authorities for issues such as non-compliance with food labels.

The Paper went to the company's registered address in Dayang Town, Chenyang Street, Hanshou County and found that the factory only produces baked products. On-site staff said that the factory never produces frozen food, let alone snail skewers. The reporter called the person in charge of the food factory, who said that if necessary, they could directly ship the goods, but could not visit the site, "I'm not there, so I can't see it."

The golden apple snail has a unique "gill-lung" respiratory system, including oval lung sacs and a well-developed comb-shaped right gill on the right side of the mantle.

The reporter bought a bag of "Master Guo" brand snail meat skewers on an e-commerce platform. The comb-shaped right gills, some with red ovarian remains and some lung sacs were visible. After identification by an unnamed expert, it was pointed out that the bag of "Master Guo" brand snail meat was highly similar to the golden apple snail.

The anatomical structure of the golden apple snail, screenshot from the paper "Morphological Structure of Golden Apple Snail" published by Hu Ziqiang and Hu Yunjin of the Department of Biology of Hunan Normal University

There are a variety of snail meat products, and various pickles made from snail meat are fresh, spicy and fragrant, and continue to sell well on e-commerce platforms.

Hunan Wei Le Shui Food Co., Ltd., located in Fengshiyan Town, Qidong County, Hengyang City, was established in 2017. Its official Douyin account has 92,000 followers and has sold 574,000 pieces in total. In addition to the popular glutinous rice cake products, its product, a canned pickled vegetable made from handmade snail meat, is available in many stores on Douyin, Taobao and other platforms. The product description states that the raw material is stone snails, and the price of a single bottle ranges from 10 yuan to 18 yuan, with some stores selling over 100 pieces.

The factory covers an area of ​​3 acres. When the reporter visited, the weather was hot and the factory gate and the doors of all production workshops were open.

"Our snail meat is strictly selected," said the female employee who received the reporter. When she showed the reporter around, a male worker was blanching the snail meat while playing with his phone. There were about 54 pounds of snail meat in the pot, which could hold 300 bottles. He said that this had to be done every two or three days. When slowly stirring, large snail meat was exposed. The water temperature was not hot, and the female employee directly pinched one out of the pot with her bare hands, saying that it was a golden apple snail, claiming that it was mixed with samples purchased recently, and then thrown back into the pot. "This kind is relatively rare, it should have been mixed with the raw materials brought back."

The female employee also revealed that the company is planning to produce a new product specifically for golden apple snails.

The crawling state of a female river snail and the ventral structure of a male round river snail, screenshots from the paper "Morphology, habits and common species of river snails in my country" published by Zhang Xi and Liu Yueying of the Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences

The employee who labels the bottles and cans said that the snail meat sauce sells very well, "I have to label a whole basket every day", with dozens of bottles in each basket. The above-mentioned female employee said that the product is sold all over the country, and sometimes hundreds of bottles of snail meat sauce are sold in a day, "Local people in other places buy a lot, they want to taste the taste of their hometown."

In addition, the factory's sanitation is worrisome. Without any sanitary safety measures, the reporter went directly into the factory.

Behind the express delivery and packaging area is the production workshop for different products. The equipment is covered with stains, the floor is slippery, various raw materials and utensils are scattered and piled up, the prepared pickles are exposed, and the bowls of fermented black beans, hot sauce and other condiments are bitten by flies. Workers in various production links are in casual clothes, no one wears masks and sanitary gloves, and some people spit directly in the sauce preparation workshop. The posted hygiene regulations are ineffective.