Bad candy

BBC News: How to get rid of 1m chocolate bars?

Cadbury has recalled more than a million chocolate bars over fears they could be contaminated with salmonella.  But how do you dispose of that many bars?  Water leaking from a pipe and splashing on to a factory conveyor belt has been blamed by Cadbury for a salmonella scare that has resulted in over a million chocolate bars being ordered off the shelves. The recall is one of the biggest in the company's history.  It says the action is precautionary and the risk of getting salmonella is low, but bacteriologist Professor Hugh Pennington, of Aberdeen University, says there is no safe level for the bug in chocolate.

"The fat in chocolate actually preserves the salmonella from the normal intestinal defences, so you don't have to eat very many salmonellas to get infected," he says.  The bug attacks the gut, causing severe sickness, vomiting and diarrhoea.  Symptoms take up to three days to appear and victims can take months to recover.  So the bars are being taken off the shelves and the problem Cadbury now faces is how to safely dispose of 250 tons of chocolate - the equivalent of 55 male elephants.

Burial, incineration and composting are three options.  If they composted it and used it as fertiliser for dairy cow feed, it could go back around for another try at being chocolate.