FDA Finds Chinese Food Producers Shut Down

[Demeter]

Source: Washington Post


FDA Finds Chinese Food Producers Shut Down

By Rick Weiss
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 11, 2007; A10



American inspectors who arrived in China last week to investigate the two companies that exported tainted pet food ingredients found that the suspect facilities had been hastily closed down and cleaned up, federal officials said yesterday.

"There is nothing to be found. They are essentially shut down and not operating," said Walter Batts, deputy director of the Food and Drug Administration's office of international programs.

....

Despite the revelations, officials sought yesterday to put a positive face on the two-month-old scandal, which includes the inadvertent sale of millions of chickens that ate the tainted feed and the ongoing quarantine of tens of thousands of hogs.

.....

Hundreds of tests on food products intended for humans have been negative for melamine, adding credence to the belief, Acheson said, that the chemical is present only in animal feeds.



Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/10/AR2007051001889.html?referrer=email

---

Did they expect anything different?

[april]

1. Right we are all safe now I feel better

[truthisfreedom]

2. Chinese mafia?

I can just picture the equivalent of a Tony Soprano over there, barking out orders.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

3. i wonder which bushbot gave them the heads up in advance?

surprising? not!

[Nikki Stone1]

28. My first thought too... (NT)_

NT

[durrrty libby]

4. Why did they take so long to inspect? This shit has been

going on for months

[Stargazer99]

7. Why did it take so long? It is your Republican care for

the average citizen. Why are American food producers allowed to use ingredients that have not been inspected? Hasn't it dawned on Joe Six Pac that his government doesn't really give a damn if he lives or dies as long as corporate America sees PROFITS?

[Igel]

14. The Chinese held up the visas.

No visa, no entry into China. They waited about a month ... claiming that the letters of invitation hadn't been sent. Unless you think that * should have sent a few Army divisions in to secure the site ... no, I didn't think so.

This happened before with some export that was tainted, a few years back. When investigators got to the plant, it was empty and all the paperwork not only packed up and moved, but the claim was it had "accidentally" been destroyed.

When I heard that the visas had been denied for week after week, I assumed that they'd find nothing on site.

[silverojo]

24. That's what happens when you import food

from a country that's basically filthy. The health/sanitation measures don't compare with ours, and quite frankly, if we wanted to eat food made in China, we'd move there.

Edited for typo.

[jollyreaper2112]

30. ARGH!

That's why we shouldn't be doing business with the motherfuckers in the first place. If they cannot abide by our standards, we should not be doing business with them. "But they can't undercut American businesses if they have to play by the rules!" Oh, really? Well, let's take the motherfuckers from the American side of the border and send them to federal "execute me and sell my organs on the black market" prison in Mainland China and see if they want to continue poisoning the American public.

[peacetalksforall]

5. Is the FDA or someone checking to see if the American brances

and distributors are filing for registration outside the U.S. or moving money off shore as the big guys do - Halli Burton, for example?

[Demeter]

6. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Work is for Peons, dude! These are government officials we're talking about--political appointees and sons of Bushes!

[MrPrax]

8. The thing that is worst than exporting

'poison' is using poison in the food chain. Why is the FDA so concerned about what goes on in China anyway. That's their problem. HOWEVER -- the companies domestically that didn't check it themselves seem to be let off the hook.

I wonder just how passive the public we would be if there were widespread deaths and the company spokesmen were still blaming some guy in China and 'we didn't know...sorry'

Didn't know about the melamine? Well then you probably don't want to know about the radiator fluid

Melamine-spiking “widespread” in China; human food broadly contaminated
Horse's Ass blog

From China to Panama, a Trail of Poisoned Medicine
NYTimes

My Original source for the NY Times story from Diligence China:

China can’t boo-hoo about being unable to control the practice. That excuse was acceptable when we were talking about copied DVDs (of films that weren’t available in the theaters) being sold outside the local supermarket. But for Pete’s sake – this place is NOT a democracy. It may not be a draconian police state anymore — but there aren’t any slick corporate lawyers spinning layers of obfuscating veils of legal trickery. These heinous scams are being perpetrated in plain view by two-bit operators who are usually bragging about the practice in public. All you have to do is open your eyes! People who say that China can’t control this kind of fraud and deceit are simply kidding themselves – or being lied to. This is a country that roots out secret groups of elderly religious adherents forming tiny communities in countryside villages. They have eradicated major cults, crushed internationally supported independence movements and co-opted vibrant economic centers. But they are continually outwitted by toothless idiots delivering deadly material on the backs of rusty bicycles? I don’t buy it.

I don't buy it either -- but the FDA sure does....wonder why?

[aquart]

16. China owns our asses?

[MrPrax]

18. Of course not...we are always free!

What it does indicate though, is that ruthless corrupt elites usually like to do business together and human life is a nuisance to their designs.

So are national standards apparently.

Getting stuff cheap and paying very little for wages was the lure to do business there in the first place; a cynic might say that while North American workers were being de-skilled, they were also being used as 'guinea pigs' for the growing pains inherent in any starting industrialization; first it was Japan, and then the flying geese soared to Korea and then on to China.

Personally I am getting sick of being a 'guinea pig' for these countries, as they test market and work through production problems, while my so-called business leaders run an economy of banks and warehouses AND run up debt to these same countries. Think of all the dollars stores...all that crap is on the charge card too.

We've been sold out...and it wasn't just one 'party'. We should have used common sense back a few years ago.

[supernova]

9. Not only that,

you can bet your sweet bippy that in a few months these same guys are going to be back in business, doing the exact same thing, under a different name.

[durablend]

12. With the FDA Seal of Approval, no doubt! n/t

[Tempest]

10. FDA to allow imported chickens from China (get ready to be sick)

In China, some farmers try to maximize the output from their small plots by flooding produce with unapproved pesticides, pumping livestock with antibiotics banned in the United States, and using human feces as fertilizer to boost soil productivity. But the questionable practices don't end there: Chicken pens are frequently suspended over ponds where seafood is raised, recycling chicken waste as a food source for seafood, according to a leading food safety expert who served as a federal adviser to the Food and Drug Administration.

China's suspect agricultural practices could soon affect American consumers. Federal authorities are working on a proposal to allow chickens raised, slaughtered, and cooked in China to be sold here, and under current regulations, store labels do not have to indicate the meat's origin.

http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2007/05/09/chicken_from_china/

[Doremus]

15. Thank you! I was looking for this article earlier and couldn't find it. n/t

[Cass]

19. This is criminal IMO.

They know damn well there is a huge problem with Chinese food safety and if they allow this to occur its criminal. Chinese imports should be halted completely or at least there should be very clear country of origin labeling.

[candice]

26. It's too "hard" for Amer companies to adequately label

their food ingredients as to country of origin. As I've found out, when I e-mail and ask if the mystery "wheat ingredients" might derive from China, the American companies don't seem to be able to readily find out (or at least pass on this information to a consumer). Vitamins and supplements consist of multiple ingredients, and it seems that this industry has been sold out to the lowest bidder (and buyer beware)--China.

[kurth]

32. And "store labels do not have to indicate the meat's origin"

Goddamned motherfuckers.

[Bo]

11. The Chinese Anti-freeze Cough Syrup killed over 100 in Panama.

It was all over the newspapers in latin America, absolutely disgusting the way its been handled by China.

[Vinnie From Indy]

13. Another great reason to start eating locally grown food

There are a growing number of farms in Indiana that are offering organic produce and livestock shares. You can buy in to the cooperative and get the bulk of your produce, meat and eggs at a cheaper price than the mega-grocers.

[loudsue]

20. Got this link on a thread yesterday for locally grown food. IT'S GREAT!

I found out there were about 10 organic or "naturally grown" farms in a very short distance from where I live (waaaay out in the boondocks) ! Fruits, veggies, poultry, meat, etc.

DUers who are concerned about the food they eat need to check out this website for a great alternative! Keep the economy OUT of the hands of the corporate whores, and protect your family! And eat delicious food while you're at it!

localharvest.com

Go there!

:kick::kick::kick:

[satya]

21. Thank you!!! n/t

[Shallah Kali]

22. it's localharvest.org not .com

this one might be of help as well...

http://www.ams.usda.gov/farmersmarkets/map.htm

[loudsue]

23. Ooops, my bad!

Thanks for the correction! :hi:

:kick::kick::kick:

[Shallah Kali]

25. no problem :-) I have to double check stuff like that myself all the time

:)

[Karenina]

17. K&R!!!

[Demeter]

27. kick for truth

[NYC]

29. One man bulldozed his own building.

His name was Mao, and he did it about 2 days before the FDA arrived. The Chinese government has since located him. I can't remember where I read that, either the NYT or the Washington Post.

... Reports said Xuzhou Anying's manager, Mao Lijun, may have been detained by Chinese authorities, claims that could not immediately be confirmed on Thursday, which was a public holiday in China...

I can't find the link to the original story.

[Shallah Kali]

31. Link: LATimes "factory sickened people and plants around here for years"

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-petfood9may09,0,6710026.story

Farmers in this poor rural area about 400 miles northwest of Shanghai had complained to local government officials since 2004 that Mao's factory was spewing noxious fumes that made their eyes tear up and the poplar trees nearby shed their leaves prematurely. Yet no one stopped Mao's company from churning out bags of food powders and belching smoke — until one day last month when, in the middle of the night, bulldozers arrived and tore down the facility.

It wasn't authorities that finally acted: Mao himself razed the brick factory — days before the investigators from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration arrived in China on a mission to track down the source of the tainted pet food ingredients.

In the end, Chinese authorities caught up with Mao and arrested him. And Tuesday, after weeks of denials, China acknowledged that Mao's company and another Chinese business had illegally exported wheat and rice products spiked with melamine, a chemical used in making plastics and fertilizers. That chemical is banned in foods in the U.S.

snip

One season after rains, Liu said, water with residue from the compound flowed into his family's cornfields and killed the crops.

[kurth]

33. FDA deputy director Walter Batts: "We are satisfied" --> MOVE ALONG, PEOPLE!

NOTHING TO SEE HERE.