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From Growing Plots to Cooking Pots: Food Safety Scrutinized

Government sources say that during the first half of 2007, 95 percent of the food products available for sale in Beijing met food quality standards.

Random tests of 43,791 samples of food conducted by the food safety supervision departments of the municipal government revealed that 97.18 percent of six major categories of food products (rice, flour, cooking oil, vegetable, and pork and bean products) were safe to eat.

Meanwhile, 141 kinds of products were pulled from store shelves for failing quality inspections, and their manufacturers’ failures were recorded in an enterprise credit management system, which will serve as a reminder of their credit records in their future operations.

A Chinese proverb says: “diseases sneak into the body through mouth,” which means food is the source of many human diseases. The importance of ensuring food safety is beyond discussion. That is why both the central and local governments have taken stringent measures when it comes to food safety. They have established a complete system monitoring all phases of food production to ensure that the food we eat is safe.

A Complete, Pre-Emptive System

The monitoring of food safety begins on the farm, where vegetables and animals are subject to testing on a regular basis.

Products produced elsewhere are denied access to the local market if they contain more pestiside residues or food additives than permitted by the State.

About 50 percent of the agricultural products consumed in Beijing come from the neighboring provinces of Shandong and Hebei. To ensure the safety of those products, since 2002, the Beijing Municipal Government has created a market-entry admission mechanism to regulate all food products available on the local market.

For pork and vegetables, the system requires that wholesale markets in Beijing must sign contracts designating certain farms, cooperatives or companies as authorized providers so that only qualified players can enter the Beijing market. Meats must be tested and granted certificates by quarantine institutions at their origins and are subject to quarantine and sanitization at checkpoints while en route to Beijing. Wholesale markets should conduct random tests before they sell meat. Vegetables must be tested both locally and after they arrive in Beijing.

Making sure agricultural products are safe to eat when they are harvested or butchered is just the first step.          

The municipal government has also established a market-entry admission system for cooked or packaged food products. The current system covers 37 major categories of pre-packaged food products and is expected to cover all processed food products by the end of 2007.

Pre-packaged food products must pass several check-ups before they are put on store shelves. To qualify for production, a food company must pass check-ups by local quality inspection authorities before applying for a business license. Food products must be subject to quarantine before they leave their production facility, and qualified food products must be marked with the “QS” (Quality Safety) symbol on their package before being made available for sale.

Restaurants: Still More Examinations

In July 2007, a set of new standards for operations of small and medium-sized restaurants in Beijing was submitted to the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine for approval. It is expected to become effective in the near future. The new standard raises the threshold of restaurant areas from 50 to 80 square metres. About one-third of Beijing's restaurants and snack bars have to make do with too small a space, which often results  in dirty kitchens. These will have to close down if the new standards win approval.

 Industry insiders believe this measure will upgrade the overall quality of the Beijing catering industry, because it will establish a bottom line for restaurant quality and sanitation.

To provide more guidance in consumers’ choices of restaurants, the Beijing Municipal Government is trying a restaurant classification campaign on 100 restaurants. Restaurants are divided into four levels (A, B, C, D) according to a set of nine criteria including their purchasing channels, and sanitary conditions.

A notice board will be erected at the entrance of the restaurants telling people which level this restaurant falls in so that customers can get a clear knowledge of whether it’s safe to eat there. The campaign will expand to cover all the restaurants in Beijing by the end of 2007.

Emergency Response System

Although a complete system has been established to monitor food safety, from the farm to the cooking pot and dining table, problem food still manages to find its way to the dining tables.

In June 2006, some customers in Beijing were diagnosed with parasitic infections after eating half-cooked fushouluo (Amazonian snails) in salads in a restaurant named Shuguoyanyi. By September 3, 2006, 131 people had been infected.

On August 22, the Beijing Food Safety Administration (FSA) ordered all wholesale and retail markets, restaurants and other food-supply companies to stop purchasing, selling or processing fushouluo. Stocks of fushouluo were destroyed. Violators of the order were subject to fines of up to 30,000 yuan (US$3,900).　

The restaurant culpable in this case was fined 410,000 yuan (US$53,300) according to the Food Hygiene Law of the People's Republic of China and Administrative Penalty Law of the People’s Republic of China.

The FSA also strengthened its monitoring of aquatic food quality and carried out educational programmes on purchasing, processing and consuming of these foods through media.

On January 14, 2007, the FSA of the Beijing Municipal Government released an emergency response plan on food safety incidents and disease outbreaks. The FDA will file alarms in times of food safety incidents in four descending levels of seriousness: read, orange, yellow and blue based on the extent, effect and other factors. Residents will be informed about the level of danger facing them, the timing of the problem, the number of affected people and the geographical area in question. Pre-emptive measures and other actions will be taken in response.

On July 24, 2007, the highly-anticipated “Beijing Food Safety Rules (draft)” was submitted to the Standing Committee of the Municipal People’s Congress for deliberation. One of the Rules calls for a food-recall system, which stipulates that food producers are obligated to recall the foods that have quality problems voluntarily and report to food safety authorities within 24 hours. Prompt and proper action can mitigate punishments in such cases. 

The Rules also specify punishments for different kinds of wrongdoing involving food safety. For example, all vegetables and aquatic products should bear an attached certificate of origin and product quality before they enter the Beijing market. Otherwise, those found accountable can be fined as much as 10,000 yuan (US$1,300). And serious violations of food safety regulations such as the illegal use of additives or the injection of water into pork could result in fines of up to 500,000 yuan (US$65,000). People held liable in extreme cases may face criminal prosecution.　　

The Rules also increase the credit costs of food safety violators. In case a food company has its business license revoked for food safety problems, the person in charge of the company will, over the next three years, not be allowed to work as the legal representative or manager of another food company.

Guaranteed Safe Food for

the Olympics

During the Olympic Games, millions of players, reporters, guests, spectators will flow into Beijing. Providing them with safe food is one of the greatest challenges facing organizers of the Games.

Preparations for ensuring a safe food supply for the 2008 Olympic Games began as early as 2005.

On July 4, 2005, the Beijing Olympic Games Food Safety Experts Commission, consisting of 15 experts from both home and abroad, was established. The commission will be responsible for advising and consulting in the drafting and execution of the Action Plan for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Food Safety.

In accordance with the Action Plan, the Game's organizers have formulated a set of standards that cover every minute detail in connection with food safety, ranging from testing of foods to their processing, packaging and transportation. Many of these are more stringent than the standards set by the World Health Organization.

The organizing committee has also designated qualified growing plots, butcheries, logistics companies and catering companies as suppliers for the Games. All the suppliers’ operations will be monitored by quality supervision authorities.

The Action Plan calls for a food-tracing system to ensure quick tracking of food problems, a major consideration since no food-handling system anywhere on earth is immune to such problems. Food provided during the Games will bear a special digital label containing basic information such as  its origin, quality standard, and time of production.

The system can even be used to track the precise path taken by food in the food production system, from the producer to the consumer. When people use a specially made card to order, the card will record the information on food materials of the dishes they have purchased, and if there is any problem, inspectors will be able to quickly locate the problem food.

All these measures will be tried in the “Good Luck Beijing” trial games that will take place from August 8, 2007, before they are used during the real Games. And some of the successful experiences will be preserved after the Olympics as long-term measures to better protect the safety of residents’ dining tables.

During the trial games, all the food safety assurance measures will be put into practice. Food samples will be collected and stored for at least 48 hours. More random tests will be conducted. The FSO has identified eight kinds of food products as the focus of monitoring including meat, bean-curd and milk products. What’s more, areas around the competition venues, scenic spots, shopping centres, transportation hubs and others are identified as focuses of food safety monitoring, and food vendors without a license will be closed down.