Nestle SA says the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is testing samples of imported Maggi noodles after the world’s largest food company halted sales in India when regulators said they contained unhealthy levels of lead.

FDA is looking into the issue and it’s not clear right now if products in the US are affected by India’s recall, Jennifer Corbett Dooren, a spokesperson at the regulator, said in an email yesterday.

Nestle doesn’t directly sell or distribute Maggi noodles in the US and they’re only offered by retailers or third parties that import the product, the company said.

The Swiss foodmaker disputes the Indian regulator’s findings and has filed a case in a local court challenging the order to recall the product.

Singapore’s Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority, which had briefly halted that country’s sales of Maggi noodles imported from India, said in a June 8 statement that its laboratory tests found the products are safe to eat.

The UK’s food regulator is also running tests on Maggi.

Nestle chief executive officer Paul Bulcke said last week Nestle has held “intense” discussions with Indian regulators over testing methodology.

The company, which has tested samples from almost 1,000 product batches and hired an independent lab to examine another 600, said it is “confident” the noodles are safe.

Nestle set up its first factory in India in 1961, and today operates eight manufacturing sites there.

India accounts for about 1.5 percent of Nestle’s 92 billion Swiss francs (RM369.22 billion) in annual revenue, according to analysts at Berenberg.

The lost Maggi sales could reduce the company’s organic sales growth this year by 0.25 percentage point, analysts at Liberum said in a note earlier this week.

- Bloomberg