Egg Mix-up Scandal"Food Safety Office: Whether eggs are washed at a legal washing facility does not affect food safety; Qin Yi: Negligence by new employees

The annual Food Safety Management Review Meeting, held once a year to examine the effectiveness of the "Five Links of Food Safety," took place yesterday (the 10th) at National Taiwan University. In response to the recent "egg mix-up incident" involving "Qin Yi Egg Products" and "Rui Mu Egg Products," the Executive Yuan's Food Safety Office emphasized that it was merely a "labeling problem," not a "food safety incident," and that whether eggs are washed at a legal washing facility makes "little difference to health and safety," sparking heated discussion on site. Many consumers believe that spending extra money to specifically buy washed eggs yet possibly getting fresh eggs of unclear origin or not processed at a legal washing facility not only harms their rights but also greatly undermines trust in our country's agricultural product certification labels.

In response, the Executive Yuan will promote full washing and selection of eggs next year and will also require eggs to be "spray-printed one by one." A briefing session for industry operators is expected to be held after next year's Lunar New Year holiday, in the hope that in the future, washed eggs sold in supermarkets can, like those in the EU and South Korea, have a number printed on each individual egg, allowing "tracing the farm through the egg" to ensure quality control at the source ranch and washing facility.

Food Safety Year-End Review Meeting Examines This Year's Promotion of the "Five Links of Food Safety" Policy

In recent years, Taiwan has seen successive major food safety incidents involving plasticizers, tainted oil, and fipronil eggs, highlighting the severe challenges facing domestic food management. In 2016 (ROC year 105), the Executive Yuan launched the "Five Links of Food Safety" policy, hoping to ensure that every step from production to the dining table meets safety standards through five major aspects: "source control," "rebuilding production management," "strengthening inspection," "increasing liability for malicious and unscrupulous manufacturers," and "public oversight of food safety," through cross-ministerial collaborative governance, so that the public can conveniently purchase safe domestic agricultural products.

To review this year's implementation results of the Five Links of Food Safety, the Executive Yuan's Food Safety Office (abbreviated as the "Food Safety Office") invited more than a hundred people, including representatives from the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the Council of Agriculture, the Environmental Protection Administration, the Ministry of Education, as well as various experts, scholars, civic groups, and industry representatives, to convene the "2019 Food Safety Management Review Meeting" yesterday (the 10th) at the GIS NTU Convention Center.

Meeting moderator and Food Safety Office Director Hsu Fu said, "This is the annual year-end food safety review meeting, and the most important thing is to listen to suggestions from all sectors on food safety management!" Through the meeting, this year's food safety incidents and policy implementation results were reviewed, and current food safety management strategies were also examined and revised.

Food Safety Office: Eggs washed at legal washing facilities show "little difference in health and safety"

However, on the eve of this year's "food safety final exam," NewsMarket exclusively revealed that some raw materials of washed eggs from "Qin Yi Egg Products," the leading domestic egg industry company, were of unclear origin, and that "Rui Mu Foods," known for producing "traceable agricultural products" eggs, was actually operating at an illegal washing facility. Two "egg mix-up incidents" occurred within one month, severely damaging consumer confidence in our country.

In response, the Food Safety Office publicly responded formally today. Hsu Fu stated that both incidents were "labeling problems," not "food safety problems" involving doubts about the eggs themselves, and that officials had immediately revoked the traceability labels and traceable agricultural product permissions of the violating operators. "From the narrow perspective of health and safety, basically even if eggs are not washed at a legal washing facility, the health and safety difference from ordinary eggs is not very large."

Hsu Fu pointed out, "As for the health and safety of eggs, actually as long as the eggshell is not broken, they are safe." But he subsequently added by way of explanation that for illegal facts, the government will still conduct regular inspections and strictly impose penalties. The Food Safety Office's "equal treatment" of the food safety quality of washed eggs from legal and illegal washing facilities sparked heated discussion on site.