23/03/13: This week in food-safety scares: mutant green river shrimp
St. Patrick’s Day reared its ugly green head when a Shanghai resident discovered that her seemingly normal shrimp unexpectedly turned green once heated.
Weibo user @Christy蜜酱 was shocked to discover that the shrimp heads had turned green when she opened the microwave. She immediately posted an image online. “The green head shrimp Weibo was shared over 1000 times. It seems as if everyone is very concerned about food safety,” she said this past Sunday.
The shrimp were purchased from a seafood market in Shanghai and cost 58 yuan per pound. Netizens peculated that the green matter was directly linked to malachite green, an anti-fungus, cancer-inducing toxic additive commonly used in aquatic farming.
On the other hand, experts firmly maintain that the green matter is due to algae build-up that became visible once the water collected in the shrimp head dried.
The green head shrimp scandal is a fresh addition to the never-ending health and food-safety scare narrative in China. This particular incident in Shanghai piggybacks on the ongoing and much-publicized 2013 Huangpu River hog wash scandal
Nestle recalls Peanut Butter Kit Kat Chunky bars here as precautionary measure
The Straits Times, Reuters | Sat Mar 23 2013
 Singapore, March 23, 2013 By Maryam Mokhtar This after the Swiss-based company had received feedback from seven customers in the United Kingdom, who each found a piece of plastic in their Kit Kat.  Get the full story from The Straits Times. Nestle withdraws four chunky KitKat varieties in eight markets By Reuters ZURICH - Nestle is recalling some special chunky varieties of its iconic KitKat chocolate brand, mainly in Britain but also in seven other markets, after consumers found pieces of plastic in the product. Nestle said in a statement that it is recalling 48g bars of the chunky version of KitKat in four flavours - peanut butter, hazelnut, chocolate fudge and caramel, as well giant eggs from the chunky collection. No other KitKat products are affected. A Nestle spokesman said the recall should not have a material impact on the world's biggest food company. KitKat is one of Nestle's top-selling brands, with 150 bars consumed worldwide every second. Nestle said the products are being recalled as a precautionary measure after seven consumers in Britain reported finding a piece of plastic in the snack. "The affected products are predominantly sold in the UK, with small amounts also sold in Germany, Switzerland, Malta, Austria, Singapore, Philippines and Canada," it said. |
23/03/13: Nestle Singapore recalls Kit Kat bars after plastic found
Nestle Singapore said it has initiated a recall of its Kit Kat Chunky Peanut Butter bar here in Singapore, after consumers in the United Kingdom reported finding a piece of plastic in the product.
The company assured consumers in a statement that no other Kit Kat products in Singapore were affected, and that it had not received any feedback of such a nature from consumers here. The statement from the company added that worldwide, Nestle has initiated a voluntary recall of four Kit Kat Chunky special varieties bars (48g size bars in Peanut Butter, Hazelnut, Chocolate Fudge and Caramel flavours) and the Kit Kat Chunky Collection Giant Egg in the United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Malta, Austria, Singapore, Philippines and Canada.
Nestle added that no other products and no further complaints had been received, but it was initiating the voluntary recall to avoid any risk to consumers.
It noted that the affected products were predominantly sold in the UK.
China gets stronger food, drug regulator
THE China Food and Drug Administration (CFDA) started operation today, marking a more powerful watchdog to address the country's accumulating food safety concerns.
The CFDA, headed by Zhang Yong, director of the food safety commission under the State Council, China's Cabinet, integrated the monitoring functions of other government organs and became a ministerial-level agency to improve food and drug safety.
The move came out of the country's renewed efforts to reduce bureaucracy and improve efficiency via a cabinet restructuring approved by the top legislature in China's just-concluded parliamentary session.
Chinese consumers have encountered a series of food safety scandals in recent years, including recycled cooking oil, tainted liquor, substandard yoghurt and harmful milk powder.
Prior to the restructuring, the previous State Food and Drug Administration was in charge of food safety in the catering industry, whereas the responsibilities of food safety supervision in the manufacturing process and market were assumed by the country's consumer quality watchdog and the industry and commerce administration, respectively.
Overlapping of supervision from different departments and some "blind spots" proved weak links in the food safety supervision system.
The new regulator, however, will be responsible for supervising the full process of food's production, circulation and consumption.
"The restructuring is a historic systematic innovation in the country's food safety administration," said Song Hualin, an associate professor of law with Nankai University.
The new regulator will better streamline administrative, technological and information resources, and that can make the supervision more effective, professional and transparent. The burden for lawful business operators will also be reduced, according to Song.
The CFDA, headed by Zhang Yong, director of the food safety commission under the State Council, China's Cabinet, integrated the monitoring functions of other government organs and became a ministerial-level agency to improve food and drug safety.
The move came out of the country's renewed efforts to reduce bureaucracy and improve efficiency via a cabinet restructuring approved by the top legislature in China's just-concluded parliamentary session.
Chinese consumers have encountered a series of food safety scandals in recent years, including recycled cooking oil, tainted liquor, substandard yoghurt and harmful milk powder.
Prior to the restructuring, the previous State Food and Drug Administration was in charge of food safety in the catering industry, whereas the responsibilities of food safety supervision in the manufacturing process and market were assumed by the country's consumer quality watchdog and the industry and commerce administration, respectively.
Overlapping of supervision from different departments and some "blind spots" proved weak links in the food safety supervision system.
The new regulator, however, will be responsible for supervising the full process of food's production, circulation and consumption.
"The restructuring is a historic systematic innovation in the country's food safety administration," said Song Hualin, an associate professor of law with Nankai University.
The new regulator will better streamline administrative, technological and information resources, and that can make the supervision more effective, professional and transparent. The burden for lawful business operators will also be reduced, according to Song.
Horse-Meat Scandal Exposes Weakness in Global Food Chain
The horse-meat storm that broke over Europe two months ago has been in one respect a tempest in a horseshoe, because it posed no threat to human health. That’s not a minor caveat in an industry where, in the U.S. alone,tainted food kills 3,000 people each year and sickens 48 million.
The horse-meat substitution has struck a nerve, however, as people wonder what else they’re eating that isn’t what they think it is.
It could be almost anything. The list of counterfeit foods Interpol found in worldwide food-fraud operations during 2011 and 2012 includes olive oil, tomato sauce, cheese, wine, candy bars, coffee, soup cubes, truffles, caviar, vodka, soy sauce and fruit juice. Consider, too, the undeclared goat, donkey and water buffalo meat that professors at South Africa’s Stellenbosch University recently found in locally produced sausages and hamburgers.
In the U.S., the nonprofit group Oceana recently confirmed that a large share of the fish in groceries and restaurants is something other than what it is sold as. Researchers did DNA tests on more than 1,200 fish samples in 14 metropolitan areas and found a third to be mislabeled. Red snapper was misrepresented so often that the researchers were at pains to find the real thing: Of 120 samples, 113 were a different fish.
What’s different today is that the food industry has become so sophisticated and supply chains so complex and global that it’s much harder to monitor what goes into a product. There’s more to watch, too: Is that expensive organic turnip really organic? Was that sustainably fished salmon sustainably fished? Is that Champagne really from the Champagne region in France?
Worse, food prices are rising in the midst of a deep economic recession. That’s putting enormous pressure on suppliers to find cheaper ingredients, and the result is rising fraud. The U.K. Food Standards Agency added 50 percent more reports to its food fraud database in 2011 than the previous year. At the same time, budgets for state inspections are falling.
The U.K. agency’s director, Steve Wearne, told Bloomberg View that inspection agencies have to choose: Should they focus on looking for otherwise healthy meat and fish substitutes, or for big money olive oil scams and fake vodka made with methanol and chloroform, which can kill? “We try to strike a balance,” he said, and it tilts toward safety.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which is working to expand its presence outside the U.S. to help monitor the global food supply chain, puts the same emphasis on safety, Commissioner Margaret Hamburg told Bloomberg View.
The question is how to inspect smarter and how to incentivize the food industry to police itself better. After all, because food fraud is a breach of trust between seller and buyer, it should be mainly up to food marketers to demonstrate that they are trustworthy.
Greater use of computers to track food and improve transparency can help. The FDA already uses databases to help it make targeted decisions on which imported foods to check for fraud. EU officials are considering adding a shared food authenticity alert system to the one they have for food safety, allowing regulators in Poland to see what their counterparts in Ireland are seeing and helping them to uncover cross-border scams earlier. They should do it.
EU agriculture ministers also are talking about extendingto all meats rules that demand certain categories of imported food identify their place of origin. Again, they should do it.
By conducting such testing even sporadically, food sellers can make it harder for fraudsters to operate. The industry now has a new tool to guide it: a public Internet database of thousands of food frauds perpetrated since 1980, compiled by the U.S. Pharmacopeial Convention.
Another useful database under construction is theInternational Barcode of Life Working Group’s catalog of DNA barcodes for thousands of fish species, which makes it easier for regulators and food companies alike to verify any fish’s identity.
Some U.S. fisheries are protecting their reputations by using computer tracking. A tracing system developed in the Gulf of Mexico, Gulf Seafood Trace, has fishermen log information about their catch of shrimp, oysters and fish into a database. That’s updated as the seafood moves through the market chain --until ultimately the person who buys it for dinner can check what it is and where and when it was caught. The peace of mind this allows consumers may make them more willing to pay a premium for the fish.
There are already laws against mislabeling. Horse carcasses in the EU are required to have passports (Europeans knowingly eat more than 200,000 horses every year). Yet the more information consumers have, and the more transparency there is in the global food supply chain, the harder it will be to dupe us about what we are eating.
To contact the Bloomberg View editorial board:view@bloomberg.net.
The horse-meat substitution has struck a nerve, however, as people wonder what else they’re eating that isn’t what they think it is.
It could be almost anything. The list of counterfeit foods Interpol found in worldwide food-fraud operations during 2011 and 2012 includes olive oil, tomato sauce, cheese, wine, candy bars, coffee, soup cubes, truffles, caviar, vodka, soy sauce and fruit juice. Consider, too, the undeclared goat, donkey and water buffalo meat that professors at South Africa’s Stellenbosch University recently found in locally produced sausages and hamburgers.
In the U.S., the nonprofit group Oceana recently confirmed that a large share of the fish in groceries and restaurants is something other than what it is sold as. Researchers did DNA tests on more than 1,200 fish samples in 14 metropolitan areas and found a third to be mislabeled. Red snapper was misrepresented so often that the researchers were at pains to find the real thing: Of 120 samples, 113 were a different fish.
Ancient Practice
Food fraud is as old as the hills. Rogue traders have been adulterating olive oil and alcohol ever since humans started making and selling them. Laws against food adulteration have existed at least since Rome made it a crime punishable by servitude or exile. Scientists have been writing treatises on the subject since at least 1820.What’s different today is that the food industry has become so sophisticated and supply chains so complex and global that it’s much harder to monitor what goes into a product. There’s more to watch, too: Is that expensive organic turnip really organic? Was that sustainably fished salmon sustainably fished? Is that Champagne really from the Champagne region in France?
Worse, food prices are rising in the midst of a deep economic recession. That’s putting enormous pressure on suppliers to find cheaper ingredients, and the result is rising fraud. The U.K. Food Standards Agency added 50 percent more reports to its food fraud database in 2011 than the previous year. At the same time, budgets for state inspections are falling.
The U.K. agency’s director, Steve Wearne, told Bloomberg View that inspection agencies have to choose: Should they focus on looking for otherwise healthy meat and fish substitutes, or for big money olive oil scams and fake vodka made with methanol and chloroform, which can kill? “We try to strike a balance,” he said, and it tilts toward safety.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which is working to expand its presence outside the U.S. to help monitor the global food supply chain, puts the same emphasis on safety, Commissioner Margaret Hamburg told Bloomberg View.
The question is how to inspect smarter and how to incentivize the food industry to police itself better. After all, because food fraud is a breach of trust between seller and buyer, it should be mainly up to food marketers to demonstrate that they are trustworthy.
Greater use of computers to track food and improve transparency can help. The FDA already uses databases to help it make targeted decisions on which imported foods to check for fraud. EU officials are considering adding a shared food authenticity alert system to the one they have for food safety, allowing regulators in Poland to see what their counterparts in Ireland are seeing and helping them to uncover cross-border scams earlier. They should do it.
EU agriculture ministers also are talking about extendingto all meats rules that demand certain categories of imported food identify their place of origin. Again, they should do it.
Supply Chains
Something more radical may be needed, though. Tesco Plc, the U.K.’s biggest grocery chain whose 60 percent horse meat spaghetti Bolognese became a poster villain, has taken the lead in the U.K. by promising to cut its supply chains shorter and source meat from inside the country wherever it can. That smells of protectionism, but not if it’s a purely commercial decision made by the food retailers to protect their brands. Tesco also promised to spend millions of pounds annually on DNA testing, to make sure its suppliers are delivering the ingredients listed on those boxes of frozen spaghetti Bolognese.By conducting such testing even sporadically, food sellers can make it harder for fraudsters to operate. The industry now has a new tool to guide it: a public Internet database of thousands of food frauds perpetrated since 1980, compiled by the U.S. Pharmacopeial Convention.
Another useful database under construction is theInternational Barcode of Life Working Group’s catalog of DNA barcodes for thousands of fish species, which makes it easier for regulators and food companies alike to verify any fish’s identity.
Some U.S. fisheries are protecting their reputations by using computer tracking. A tracing system developed in the Gulf of Mexico, Gulf Seafood Trace, has fishermen log information about their catch of shrimp, oysters and fish into a database. That’s updated as the seafood moves through the market chain --until ultimately the person who buys it for dinner can check what it is and where and when it was caught. The peace of mind this allows consumers may make them more willing to pay a premium for the fish.
There are already laws against mislabeling. Horse carcasses in the EU are required to have passports (Europeans knowingly eat more than 200,000 horses every year). Yet the more information consumers have, and the more transparency there is in the global food supply chain, the harder it will be to dupe us about what we are eating.
To contact the Bloomberg View editorial board:view@bloomberg.net.
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