A transport issue is believed to be behind lead contamination in some brands of raw and brown sugar.
Routine testing on imported sugar from Australia showed three brands had detectable levels of lead.
The Ministry of Primary industries has asked consumers to throw out or return bags of Chelsea Sugar, Woolworths and Pams brands sold over the last month. It has full details of the affected batch numbers on its website.
MPI deputy director-general of New Zealand food safety Vince Arbuckle told Morning Report the explanation of a cross contamination at some point in the shipping process was not satisfactory to MPI or Chelsea sugar.
"They're not they're not happy with that either. So, they'll be doing their investigation. What that does confirm is that it's an isolated event, and not something that part of their supply channels normally, it's an adverse event."
Arbuckle said the risk to consumers who bought the sugar was low and the recall was a precautionary move.
"It's 1.11 parts per million, extremely low level, but it's a detectable level. What we want is to get to a point where these sorts of foods have no detectable levels."
He said the duration and amount of the sugar that people would consume over the affected period meant the risk to human health was low.
