Tainted kelp: 135,000 kg already eaten in Taichung and Pingtung - has it spread nationwide? Ministry of Health and Welfare to report on Friday
The Kaohsiung District Prosecutors Office yesterday busted Daxin Chemical for selling industrial-grade "ammonium bicarbonate" and "ammonium aluminum sulfate" to downstream operators for making kelp; besides a Pan operator in Kaohsiung who had purchased them and made kelp that flowed out to 49 vendors in Kaohsiung, today the Ministry of Health and Welfare continued tracing the flow, and operators in Taichung City and Pingtung County had also purchased them, together making nearly 130,000 kg of tainted kelp; the operators admitted they had indeed purchased them but had already stopped using them.
As for whether the tainted kelp flowed into the whole of Taiwan, Wang Deyuan, deputy director of the Northern District Management Center of the Food and Drug Administration under the Ministry of Health and Welfare, said that this week health bureaus in every jurisdiction nationwide will strengthen inspections and report the inspection results this Friday.
129,600 kg of tainted kelp made in Taichung already eaten
Kelp operators add legal food-grade "ammonium bicarbonate", commonly known as "ammonium powder", during the soaking process, in order to make the kelp fluffy and soft, but unscrupulous operators, in order to save costs, use industrial-grade "ammonium bicarbonate" that is prohibited from being added to food; although the harm to the human body is still unknown, it may contain heavy metals and impurities.
Yesterday the Kaohsiung District Prosecutors Office uncovered the tainted kelp case, and the outflow range included 49 vendors in Kaohsiung and operators in Taichung City and Pingtung County. The Food and Drug Division of the Taichung City Government Health Bureau said that after receiving notice from the Pingtung County Health Bureau that a Gu operator of "Shenghua Trading Company" in Fengyuan had purchased industrial raw materials to make and sell kelp products, it had inspected that operator.
At present, the finished products for sale by operator Gu inspected on site are all compliant, and it is confirmed that legal food-grade "ammonium bicarbonate" was used, but it cannot be guaranteed that the operator had not previously used illegal additives, and detailed information must be compared with the source in Pingtung County.
According to the Taichung City Government Health Bureau, "Shenghua Trading Company" purchased industrial-use "ammonium bicarbonate" from Daxin Chemical starting in September 2012, and as of the end of January 2015, it is estimated to have purchased 18 bags of "ammonium bicarbonate" and 72 bags of "sodium bicarbonate", 90 bags in total (2250kg), which were used to clean and soften, then rinsed and soaked with acetic acid and clean water, together making nearly 216,000 Taiwan jin (129,600 kg) of kelp, sold to traditional markets in Taichung and Fengyuan (Dongxing Market, Shangjingxing Market, Shijia Market and Fengyuan Fruit and Vegetable Market, etc.).
After Daxin Chemical notified them around February 3 of this year that it must not be used in food, operator Gu immediately stopped using it; because the shelf life of kelp products is only 2 days, they had all been sold out.
Operator Gu in Pingtung had purchased them, and had made over 5640 kg of tainted kelp
Lu Yifen, section chief of the Food Management Division of the Pingtung County Health Bureau, pointed out that after comparing and further investigating Daxin's downstream shipment data, it was found that kelp operator Gu in Pingtung County and the operator in Taichung City are father and son, and operator Gu had purchased ammonium powder from Daxin Chemical between January and November last year.
After sending personnel to inspect last Friday (March 20), no illegal additives were found on site. Lu Yifen said operator Gu admitted having purchased chemical-grade ammonium powder and heavy soda, together making about 5640 kg of kelp, mostly sold to traditional markets. Under Article 15, Paragraph 1 of the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation, food must not be added with additives not approved by the central competent authority. The health bureau will subsequently refer the investigation results to the district prosecutors office for investigation.
Nationwide expanded inspections of kelp producers this week, results reported Friday
As for whether the tainted kelp flowed into the whole of Taiwan, Wang Deyuan, deputy director of the Northern District Management Center of the Food and Drug Administration under the Ministry of Health and Welfare, said that the "special inspection project for food additive sellers" had been ongoing all along, and yesterday the southern district announced the results of kelp-soaking operators illegally using industrial-grade ammonium bicarbonate; Minister of Health and Welfare Chiang Ping-huang has ordered that this week health bureaus in every jurisdiction nationwide will strengthen inspections and report the inspection results this Friday.
Wang Deyuan said that at the beginning of the year they had already discussed with scholars and experts, and with reference to illegal additives commonly added to food at home and abroad, had listed more than 50 items, and had sent official letters to county and city health bureaus, so that in future food sampling they will give priority to inspections and expand random testing; but some items currently still have no testing method, and the Food and Drug Administration and the laboratories of health bureaus everywhere will successively develop testing methods.
For example, in the recent sodium formaldehyde sulfoxylate case, as of now, more than 200 items have been sampled, whereas before health bureaus would not have sampled so many at all, Wang Deyuan said.
In the past it was always after receiving a tip-off that the government went to patch the net, but Wang Deyuan said that now the Food and Drug Administration and health bureaus will all proactively strengthen their checks. He also predicted that more food safety news may still appear this year, because of expanded inspections; some problems may have existed before, only they were not found, and he hopes that after being banned the operators can be more law-abiding.