Inferior food makers to be eliminated
By Zhao Huanxin (China Daily)
Updated: 2004-09-13 10:51

The country's quality inspection authorities pledged on Saturday to deny market access to any food products that fail to pass the strict scrutiny of a new "market access system" by the end of next year, quality supervisor Ji Zhengkun said in Beijing.

Ji, an official of the General Administration of Quality Supervision and Inspection and Quarantine, made the remarks at a meeting to mark the 10th Mooncake Festival, which leads up to the traditional Mid-Autumn Festival on September 28.

Food has been elevated to China's second largest pillar industry, producing output value of more than 1 trillion yuan(US$120 billion) a year, according to official statistics.

However, a spate of food poisoning incidents, like contaminated rice and fake infant milk powder scandals in recent years have put food safety in the spotlight, prompting authorities to instigate sweeping campaigns to win back consumers' appetite.

Already, a nationwide examination of producers of five major staple food - wheat flour, vinegar, sauce, cooking oil and rice - has resulted in the revocation of market access for more than 30,000 firms, because of their inadequate production conditions and quality standards, Ji said.

As a result, only 22,000 producers of the five food products, or 36 per cent of the total, were awarded production permits to produce foods labelled with the "Quality Safe" (QS) mark for the first time, he said.

Following the procedure, Ji's agency has proceeded to enforce a market access regime for producers of 10 more food types.

They include meats, dairy, drinks, condiments, snack noodles, biscuits and puffed food products.

"As of today, 2,500 out of 44,000 producers of the 10 food products have passed market access assessment," Ji said. "We'll start clearing producers without permits from market on July 1 (2005)."

In China, food products fall into 28 categories. Apart from the 15 kinds being targetted, the remaining 13 types will be ready for the new "market access regime" by the end of 2005, Ji said.

"With the market access arrangement, we are hoping to create a fair competition between enterprises, a good environment for investors and to put consumers at ease about their food choices," he said.

In particular, product supervision authorities will take a harder look at the quality of food for children and problems in rural areas, Ji said.

A food poisoning case outraged the country earlier this year in which fake infant milk powder led to 13 deaths and the malnutrition of 189 babies in Anhui's city of Fuyang.

The State Council has streamlined the country's food quality control process, which used to involve a dozen of government agencies, Ji revealed.

Under the new arrangement, the Ministry of Agriculture will be held responsible for quality control of raw agricultural products in the course of crop growing and animal and aquatic breeding.

Ji's agency will oversee the food production process.

The State Administration for Industry and Commerce supervises food circulation, while the health departments will take care of the supervision of catering sector.

The food and drug administration agencies will co-ordinate food safety work, Ji quoted a State Council circular as saying.

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