Announcements

Dear Customer, Vendor, Business Partner,

Emperor Specialty Foods Ltd. is constantly monitoring the impact of the Coronavirus disease 2019 (known as COVID-19) for our customers, vendors, and partners. As such, we wish to keep you informed of the actions that we are taking to ensure the safety of our employees, the food chain, and the well being of customers, vendors, and partners.

Maintaining food safety is our #1 priority to ensure that products received from our vendors arrive clear of any issues to our valued customers and their consumers. In addition, it is critical to our communities that a safe food supply is maintained, particularly under the current circumstances where there will be more people falling ill than what is typical. Please also refer to the attached statement from the CPMA, which outlines the health and security of the produce food supply within the Produce industry.

Within our operations, to help ensure the safety of our employees, we have increased the frequency of cleaning and sanitization of high touch surfaces at our facility. We have also implemented the usage of disinfectant in our routine sanitation procedures.

We continue to emphasize to our employees the importance of following high standards for personal hygiene.  Detailed notices are posted at all facilities reminding employees to wash their hands often, cover their mouth/nose when coughing/sneezing, and to regularly clean surfaces and shared items. As of Wednesday, March 18th, 2020, we are establishing a screening process to check all customers and visitors to our facilities.  Furthermore, we are advising all
staff members that they to be tested for COVID-19 and stay home if they are ill as well as self-isolation for 14 days if they have been travelled outside of Canada.

In addition, we are developing a contingency plan for our facility with our partner Fresh Direct Produce, if issues arise that adversely impact our facility, to ensure normal operations and continuous produce supply. While no issues have occurred to date, we want our teams to be prepared to manage any potential situations.

Finally, all ESF staff are eliminating non-essential travel and meetings to reduce the potential impact of COVID-19 exposure until further notice (avoiding flying, large gatherings, etc.).

Thank you for your patience and understanding during this challenging time.

If you have any specific questions for us or want to share what your organization is doing to manage the potential disruption caused by COVID-19 proactively, please reach out to your regular contact person at Emperor Specialty Foods.

Yours Sincerely,

Jozef Hubburmin