New Zealanders were honest people who tried to continuously improve and do things better.

"We must prove to our customers that our high standards of food production are more than words. We must prove that by our deeds and actions."

"This is the case 99.9 percent of the time, however, in this instance, there was a problem. We need to understand why and make sure it does not happen again. This is what our farmers want and I can assure you we will work hard to make sure this happens," Wills said.

The New Zealand government Thursday stated that the products known to be potentially affected were confined to three batches of 38 metric tons of whey protein concentrate manufactured at one Fonterra plant in New Zealand.

These were subsequently used as an ingredient to manufacture about 870 metric tons of infant formula, juice and dairy beverages, yoghurt, body building powder as well as animal stock food.

The contamination occurred in May last year, and testing in March this year indicated a problem. This was confirmed on July 31 and Fonterra informed the authorities in New Zealand on August 2.