South Africa's Tiger Brands Ltd., a producer of packaged foods and meats, said March 19 that it had decided to close a factory in Pretoria as a precaution as part of an ongoing investigation into an outbreak of listeria.

At the same time, Tiger Brands instituted a product recall of all Snax products.

The move follows the discovery of "the presence of very low levels of listeria" at the Pretoria meat-processing facility.

It is the third Tiger Brands facility affected by the outbreak, which Reuters reported has killed more than 180 people in 14 months.

The epidemic has been traced to the company's processed meat "polony," a local variant of Bologna sausage made by its Enterprise Food in the northern city of Polokwane, according to a Reuters report. Tiger Brands already has closed factories at Polokwane and Germiston.

The company said the operations at its Clayville abattoir, which supplied the three facilities, would be wound down with the objective of suspending operations completely at the end of March 2018.

Tiger Brands on March 5 recalled its meat products after the department of health linked the listeria outbreak to one of its factories. Tiger Brands CEO Lawrence MacDougall assured that the company would address valid claims "in the event that a tangible link is established between our products and listeriosis illnesses or fatalities."