Multinational food companies offer Polish consumers products of lower quality and with different ingredients than on Western markets, a newspaper has reported, citing Poland's Central Auditing Office (NIK).

The office’s head, Krzysztof Kwiatkowski, told the Rzeczpospolita daily newspaper: “Tests carried out on products available on Polish and Western European markets have shown dual food quality.”

He added: “Further intensive inspections and awareness campaigns are needed as consumers are largely oblivious to the problem.”

A total of 48,000 inspections were carried out from 2014 to 2017 by the provincial offices of the Polish Trading Standards Association (IH), which has been audited by NIK.

The Central Auditing Office said: “It emerged that 38 percent of the tested product batches from nearly half of the inspected shops failed to meet national norms and EU directives.”

(aba/gs)

Source: Rzeczpospolita, GUS