China and Food Safety

This is not good.

Investigators from the House Energy and Commerce Committee spent two weeks snooping around China and probably haven't eaten since. Their investigation revealed a tattered regulatory framework, unable to protect Chinese citizens, let alone foreigners. Among the disturbing facts uncovered:

• China's food system is fueled by hundreds of millions of private farms, "many no larger than a basketball court." These small private farms are often their proprietor's sole source of income; productivity is valued over safety.
• China's General Administration of Quality, Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIQ) is responsible for export quality control, but most supervision is left to local officials. Of course, "some voiced the opinion that some corruption was evident at the local level."
• "If the Chinese system worked as described, it would be a closed and therefore safe system. Committee staff, however, did not find an American or other multinational executive operating in China who believes that China has a competent, independent inspector stationed at each of the 3,700 plants that, according to Chinese officials, are fully HACCP-controlled. Committee staff also was unable to find anyone who believed that every single lot was sampled. It is further believed that the export certificates are subject to counterfeiting."

And this is the good news. The inspectors originally wanted to visit the two plants responsible for the melamine wheat gluten contamination. In response, the Chinese delayed the investigators' visas. By the time the investigators arrived on site, one plant had been bulldozed. The other was chained-off, its records held by the local police, and thus, confidential.

There is no regulatory culture in China. Expedience and low cost is the only rule. We had this problem at one time. Books like The Jungle helped to build a culture of food safety. It became bad business to deliver tainted goods. We still have incidents of contaminated food, but it is the exception, not the rule. Until the cost of delivering contaminated food is more than the cost of untainted food, this will continue.