McDonald's Appoints Food Safety Chief to Win Back Customers in China

McDonald's is hoping its latest moves in China will get customers back in their doors. In response to the latest safety concerns, McDonald's appointed a chief food safety officer in China to oversee the making of meals and added unannounced third party audits. It hopes the customers who went for the exit can give it another chance. McDonald's former senior director of Global Food Safety, Quality and Nutrition, Cindy Jiang, will fill the food safety chief role on interim basis. She will oversee all food sourcing and production process and has the authority to veto any supplier. McDonald's said that going forward, half of the safety audits in China will be unannounced. That's a big change because workers usually knew when the audits were coming. Third party auditors will perform the inspection on top of McDonald's internal team. A hotline will be added by the end of this year for people to report violations. Chinese customers' confidence in McDonald's largely vanished after the media uncovered its top supplier passed off expired meat as fresh. Sales slumped since July and McDonald's wants to do whatever it takes to keep the 2,000 restaurants in the country in business. There will be no surprise if it introduces more safety measures in the near future.