DIS Walt Disney Co

Walt Disney Co. will allow visitors to Shanghai Disneyland to bring their own food inside the theme park, in a reversal that follows a public outcry over perceived discrimination against Chinese customers.

"Visitors will be allowed to carry in food for their own consumption, except those that need to require reprocessing, those that require warm storage and those with pungent odors," Xue Binjun, director of the Shanghai Disney Resort complex, which includes Shanghai Disneyland, was quoted telling China's state-run People's Daily.

The policy shift comes after a Chinese law student sued Disney in March over the entertainment giant's ban on outside food at the Shanghai theme park.

Shanghai Disneyland and Shanghai Shendi Group Co Ltd., the state-owned majority shareholder of the joint venture with Walt Disney, didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.

Last month, Chinese state media investigated the practice, decrying it as a double standard since Disney allows visitors to bring food inside its U.S. and European theme parks. The student's legal campaign then went viral on Chinese social-media websites, and was the subject of a recent Wall Street Journal front-page story.

The backlash against Disney comes as China and the U.S. spar over trade, and as Chinese consumers boycott other Western brands, from Versace to Apple, over their perceived disrespect of China's territorial integrity.

Bingyan Wang

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 06, 2019 08:25 ET (12:25 GMT)

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