Starting next year, the Ministry of Health and Welfare will progressively implement mandatory food registration.
In the past two years, a number of food safety problems have broken out one after another in China. To make amends, the Ministry of Health and Welfare will, starting next year, successively include food additives, meat products, dairy products and others in a mandatory registration system. The registration measures announced in advance by the Ministry of Health and Welfare show that the business categories to be included in mandatory registration next year are: food additives; meat industry operators importing food; aquatic products; dairy products; plastic food containers, utensils and packaging operators; registered lunch box factories; and the health food industry. Starting the year after next, starch, fresh refrigerated fruits and vegetables, bulk grains, and chain fast food operators will also be subject to mandatory registration.
Tsai Shu-chen, head of the Food Division of the Food and Drug Administration under the Ministry of Health and Welfare, pointed out that at the current stage, the food registration management system is based on food additive operators "voluntarily registering" single-ingredient and compound additive items. As of the end of last month, a total of 629 operators had registered 2,697 types of additives. Through the mandatory food registration management system, health authorities can better grasp the sources and destinations of food raw materials, semi-finished products and finished products.
Tsai Shu-chen said that food registration is an inevitable trend, and the industry will certainly go through a period of growing pains. The Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation stipulates that food operators who refuse mandatory registration and fail to make corrections within the prescribed time limit will face fines ranging from 30,000 yuan to 3 million yuan; in serious cases, they may be ordered to suspend operations, cease business for a certain period, have all or part of their company, business or factory registration items revoked, or have their registration revoked. Those whose registration is revoked may not re-register within 1 year.
