- Email: [email protected]
Food safety assurance systems in China
Food Control 18 (2007) 480–484 www.elsevier.com/locate/foodcont
Food safety assurance systems in China Li Bai a
a,¤
, Chenglin Ma a, Shunlong Gong b, Yinsheng Yang
a
College of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, Jilin University, 5988 Renmin Street, Changchun 130025, PR China b College of Management, Jilin University, 5988 Renmin Street, Changchun 130025, PR China Received 4 July 2005; received in revised form 5 December 2005; accepted 9 December 2005
Abstract China’s food industry grows fast since 1980s, with an average annual growth rate over 13%. Likewise the frequent outbreak of foodborne illness in China makes evident the deWciency of food safety assurance systems. The paper discussed food safety assurance systems in China. SpeciWcally, the paper Wrstly introduced China’s food industry, food safety status and origin, food safety regulation agencies, and then compared two kinds of food safety assurance systems applied in China, in particular their market objectives, functions, management modes and resulting constraint forces on food producers, etc. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Food safety; Assurance systems; Regulation; China
1. Introduction With the economic growth and development of populated urbanized centers, Chinese consumers have showed more and more interest in food quality and safety. Likewise the frequent outbreaks of foodborne illness in China made evident the urgent need for more eYcient food safety assurance systems. The aim of the paper is to introduce food safety assurance systems in China, whose food industry has grown fast since 1980’s with an average annual growth rate of over 13%. Whitehead (1995), senior oYcer of Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, argued that an eVective food control systems were composed of food law, national food control strategy and food control agencies and their services. Huei-Yann Joann Jeng and Fang (2003) introduced Taiwan’s food safety control systems by taking food service sector as an example, and introduced that Taiwan’s Department of Health was the major food control agency, and was actively expanding HACCP in Taiwan’s
*
Corresponding author. Tel./fax: +86 431 509 5442. E-mail address: [email protected] (L. Bai).
0956-7135/$ - see front matter © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.foodcont.2005.12.005
food service sector to increase the competitive power of Taiwan food industry in international market. Development Research Center of the State Council of PR China organized researchers from more than 50 organizations and conducted a research on China’s National Food Safety Strategy (Chen & Deng, 2004). The research introduced China’s food safety issues from diVerent aspects in the round and put forward strategic and median and long-term development plans for China’s national food safety system. Based on the above research results, the paper introduced China’s food safety assurance systems speciWcally and thoroughly. 2. Status of food safety in China 2.1. Food industry in China Based on the “Food Sanitation Law of PR China”, a basic law on food safety in China, food is deWned as “Wnished products and materials that are edible and drinkable for people, including those which belong to both food and medicines in a traditional sense, but not including those used for treatment”. According to Third National Industrial Census of China, China’s food industry comprises salt
L. Bai et al. / Food Control 18 (2007) 480–484
mining industry, food processing industry, food manufacturing industry, drinking manufacturing industry and tobacco processing industry (Yearbook of China’s Food Industry, 1997). Compared with the industry in developed countries, China’s food industry still underdeveloped since the output value of China’s food industry mealy equaled to 30% of the output value of agriculture and among the value of consumed food, processed food merely occupied 30% in 2004 (Xu & Li, 2004). However, China’s food industry developed very fast, with an annual growth rate of 13.5% from 1980 to 2004, and provided the most employment among all the industries. According to the preliminary data published by National Development and Reform Commission of PR China, the output value of food industry attained to about USD $1971 hundred million in 2004, standing Wrst in sequent 11 years among all industries in China. According to statistics, among the total output value of China’s food processing and manufacturing industries in 2003, the output value of large and middle-sized enterprises attained to RMB 3502 hundred million, comprising 41.9% of the total output value (Gung, 2003). 2.2. Status of food safety in China According to the bulletin of China’s Ministry of Health (MOH), 2305 cases on serious food poisoning accidents were received during 2004, 42,876 persons involved and 255 persons died. Compared with the bulletin of 2003, the cases, involved persons and died persons increased respectively 55.6%, 44.9% and ¡0.03%. In 2004, the reasons of food poisoning were microbe contamination (making up 58.1% of all poisoning persons), chemical contamination (making up 16.6% of all poisoning persons, but 58.5% of all died persons), poisonous animals and plants (making up 9.4% of all poisoning persons) and others. Table 1 shows the serious food poisoning cases issued by MOH from 2001 to 2004. One reason for the sharp increase of food poisoning cases in 2003 and 2004 is the stricter regulation, which makes more food poisoning cases exposed. Although the data in Table 1 showed an upward tendency of the food poisoning cases, China’s food safety situation is actually changing in a positive way considering the fact that the qualiWed rate of food product in national sampling check was 88.1% in 2001, 89.5% in 2002, 90.5% in 2003 and 89.8% in 2004 (Yan & Yan, 2004). However, the result of random Table 1 Serious Food poisoning cases issued by MOH from 2001 to 2004 Year
Food poisoning cases
Involved persons
Died persons
2001a 2002a 2003a 2004b
624 464 1481 2305
20,124 11,572 29,600 42,876
143 68 262 255
a
Source of data: Statistical Bulletin of China’s Health Service (2001– 2003), MOH, http://www.moh.gov.cn/tjxxzx/tjsj/tjgb/index.htm. b Source of data: Document [2005] No. 58 issued by Ministry of Health.
481
test on more than 2000 kinds of food products made by China’s Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) in 2003 showed that the average up-to-standard rate was 82.1% and the average up-to-standard rate of food products produced by small-sized enterprises was merely 76.2% (www.aqsiq.gov.cn), which showed that China still faced serious food safety situation even though it was changing in a positive way. In addition, China’s Consumers’ Association proclaimed that in 2004 they totally received 52,249 complaints including 1811 cases on food safety, with an increase of 11.7% compared with those of 2003 (http://www.cca.org.cn/). Consumers’ main complaints focused on containing deleterious materials, doping foreign matters and exceeding shield life. Doping foreign matters is rarely complained in developed countries because most kinds of food are processed in an enclosed way there. However, quite a bit of food is processed by manual work in China, therefore doping foreign matters is very common, especially when workers are not practiced. Reviewing China’s food safety accidents, such as polished grains with mineral oil, fake milk powder in Fuyang city and poisonous wine in Guangzhou city, we can conclude that China’s food safety accidents were caused by two factors. The Wrst factor lies in contaminated raw materials, that is, raw materials contain toxic ingredient or zoonosis pathogens, and the second factor lies in insuYcient sanitation control and the introduction of foreign matters during food processing like food additives and eyewinkers. As a whole, food producers have three direct purposes to produce unsafe food. First, to reduce production costs by using inferior materials or by decreasing dosages, fake milk power in Fuyang City and poisonous wine in Guangzhou city are typical examples. Second to beautify product’s surface and make it attractive, typical examples are dipping hams with dichlorvos and smoking vermicelli with nitrate. Third, to change products’ certain characters like extending shelf life by using food additives or adopting improper manufacturing and packaging process. Consumers can directly judge whether a product is cheap or specious but cannot judge whether it is safe or not. So, food producers’ Wnal aim of reducing production costs, beautifying product’s surface and changing certain product characters is to earn more proWts. When ex ante food standards are not perfect and ex post punitive measures are not severe and eYcient, for example, when higher communication costs among regulation agencies and lack of sophisticated detection facilities make food safety management diYcult, producers will possibly give in the safety character which may be detected and pursue the more direct characters of low price and specious surface. 3. Functions of China’s oYcial food regulation agencies China’s food safety is regulated by eight oYcial agencies, Department of Agriculture (DA), Ministry of Public Security (MPS), Board of Trade (BOT), Ministry of Health
482
L. Bai et al. / Food Control 18 (2007) 480–484
Table 2 Food safety regulation agencies and duties Regulation link
Main food safety problems in the link
Regulation agency
Assistant regulation agencies
Planting and feeding
Planting: pollution of fertilizes and pesticides; Feeding: contamination of animal remedies and foodstuV additives Food additives; Foreign materials being introduced during processing; Sanitation authorization Counterfeit and inferior product; False publicity Sanitation authorization; Improper food prepare process and unscientiWc consuming habit, such as cross-contamination etc.
DA
EPA, MPS, SFDAa
AQSIQ
MOH, AIC, BT, EPA, MPS, SFDAa
AIC MOH
BOT, BOT, MPS, SFDAa AIC, BT, MPS, SFDAa
Processing Circulating Consuming
a
SFDA, an department directly under State Department of China, was established on the basis of State Drug Administration in March of 2003. SFDA are responsible for general supervision and harmonization for the regulation of food, health products and cosmetics, and for prosecuting serious food safety accidents.
(MOH), Administration for Industry and Commerce (AIC), Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ), State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA), Environment Protection Agency (EPA), all of them directly under the lead of State Council of China. Before 2004, duties of these regulation agencies overlapped and intercrossed largely, therefore State Council of China issued an Act named “Decision on Further Enhancing Food Safety Management” in 2004 to harmonious food safety regulation agencies. Based on the Act, diVerent regulation agencies are assigned to control diVerent links of food supply chain rather than diVerent kinds of food products, which is diVerent with the regulation styles of some countries, such as America. Table 2 summed up the functions of China’s food safety regulation agencies. DA is responsible for regulating the link of primary agricultural products, AQSIQ for manufacturing and processing, AIC for circulation, MOH for food consumption and SFDA for general supervising, harmonizing, and investigating and prosecuting serious food safety accidents.
ity system and HACCP system etc., which are implemented by producers in a voluntary way. The purpose of these systems is to satisfy consumers’ demands for higher quality in food market. In common, product standards of these systems are stricter than those of QS system. So according to the diVerence of government’s control forces on food producers, China’s food safety assurance systems can be divided into two broad headings: (1) food safety admittance systems, implemented by oYcial regulation agencies throughout China in a compulsive way, aiming to satisfy the public’s basic demands for consuming safety food; (2) food safety consumer assurance systems, implemented by producers in a voluntary way, aiming to satisfy consumers’ demands for higher quality and to acquire more admittance in international market. Table 3 compared the two systems’ diVerence from the areas of market objectives, management styles, constraint force on producers, etc.
4. Food safety assurance systems applied in China
The primary function of compulsive food safety admittance system in China, such as QS system, is to boost up consumers’ conWdence in China’s food industry. Investigation showed that more than half of Chinese consumers were “worried” about China’s food safety status and almost half of respondents considered that food in Chinese market was not so safe as it was (Zhang, Li, & Zhang, 2004; Zhou, Ying, Huo, & Peng, 2004). In such a condition, Chinese government implemented QS system to save consumers’ conWdence in China’s food industry since consumers’ distrust not only made the social welfare decrease because many consumers contracted their food choice category by removing uncertain food from their shopping list but also made a negative eVect on the sustainable development of China’s food industry. The second function of compulsive food safety admittance systems is to optimize the structure of China’s food industry. Taking QS system as an example, food sold in the market without admittance marks (QS) and (or) forging admittance marks will be conWscated, and the production
Foundation of China’s food safety assurance systems is “Food Quality Safety Market Access System (QS System)”, which is implemented by AQSIQ throughout China in a compulsive way. AQSIQ marks a tag of “QS (ABB of Quality Safety)” on food products passed tests of AQSIQ or its aYliated agencies. The tag of QS is not only an admission ticket to market but also an important marker for consumers to discern products safe or not. Among the 28 kinds of food in China, Wve essential kinds of rice, wheat Xour, edible oil, sauce and vinegar were implemented QS system in 2003; most of the 10 primary kinds food, such as meat products, dairy products, convenience food, fast-frozen food, soft drinks, condiment, puVed food, etc. were implemented QS system in 2004; and all of the 28 kinds of food will have implemented the QS system by the end of 2006. Besides QS System, there are still other food safety assurance systems, such as Green Food certiWcation, Organic food certiWcation, China’s Brand-name Product, ISO qual-
4.1. Compulsive food safety admittance systems
L. Bai et al. / Food Control 18 (2007) 480–484
483
Table 3 China’s food safety assurance systems Broad headings
Market objectives
Constrained force on producers
Typical system
Contents
Management modes
Food safety admittance systems
Satisfy the public’s demands for safety food
Compulsively implemented in food industry through China by AQSIQ
Food Quality Safety Market Access System
License system for food production; Compulsive product test before leaving factory; Mark a tag on products passed tests
Food safety consumer assurance systems
Satisfy the demands of higher income consumers and acquire more admittance in international market
Voluntarily implemented in food industry under consumers’ further demands
Green Food certiWcation; Organic Food certiWcation; China’s Brand-name Products; HACCP system; ISO system
Environmental standard of producing area; Processing, packaging, storing and shipping standards; Final product standards; Complete records on processing and distributing; Trademark management
Random sample test; Inspect major products; special inspect on certain products; Patrolling, revisiting, annually censoring and spot-checking food enterprises; punishment Third party certiWcation; Exemption from inspection during valid date; Inspect under the demands of producers and consumers
license of these producers will be revoked. Therefore the implementation of food safety admittance systems compels a lot of individual workshops under worse operating conditions to wash out from market and keeps legal food producers away from the negative inXuence of illegal food producers like pretenders. Although the implementation of QS System aims to assure consumers of the reliability of food quality, some Xaws in the system itself and in its enforcement process make it ineYcient. First, are products producing by qualiWed food producers surely the products that can be safely consumed? According to QS system, food producers that have obtained sanitation authorization and possessed necessary production and inspection facilities required by QS system must send sample products to legal agencies to test and decide whether the products can enter market with a mark of QS on package or not. However, because of the shortage of funds, inspection equipments and inspectors, most inspect items are less than those of industrialized countries. Take rice as an example, Japan’s regulation agencies check 132 items while agencies in China only check over 10 items. What’s more, incomplete credit system and lacking of wash-out system in China make a lot of food companies lose motive to continue upgrading product’s quality after acquiring market admittance, and even the enterprises with favorable working conditions may choose to ease their quality control to reduce production costs. Secondly, QS System focuses on large and middle-sized enterprises too much. One objective of AQSIQ is that the large and middle-sized food enterprises that acquired “QS” admittance attain to 90% among all of the large and
middle ones (http://www.china.org.cn). However, ad hoc survey conducted by AQSIQ from 2001 to 2003 showed that 70% of China’s food enterprises were some kinds of workshops with less than 10 workers (Pan, 2005). Therefore, the means of enforcement like “managing large while easing small” cannot completely wash out the 70% workshops from food market. Although the production value of the 70% only occupies 5% of total food production value (Ye, 2004), most false and inferior food, like fake milk power in Fuyang city and poisonous wine in Guangzhou city, were products of those workshops. Anymore, most of the workshops locate in the juncture of urban and rural, where the residents earn less, receive little education and prefer the cheaper rather than the safer, and more easily be hurt. 4.2. Voluntary food safety consumer assurance systems Aims of voluntary food safety consumer assurance systems are to satisfy the demands for higher quality products of domestic consumers with higher income and to acquire more admittance in international market. In China, these kinds of systems mainly include Green Food CertiWcation system, Organic Food CertiWcation system and China’s Brand-name Product authorization, HACCP system and ISO management system, the last two mainly focusing on the process management while the others mainly focusing on performances of Wnal products. Here we take Green Food CertiWcation system, which becomes more and more popular in China food market, as an example to analyze the function of voluntary food safety consumer assurance systems.
484
L. Bai et al. / Food Control 18 (2007) 480–484
Green Food certiWcation has been implemented in China since 1990, under the charge of National Green Product Development Center of DA and its aYliated Green Food OYces in each province. With the popularity of Green Food in China, up to the end of 2004, enterprises gained Green Food certiWcation attained to 2836, and the varieties of Green Food attained to 6496 in China market, with gross output of 46,000 million ton and sales value of more than $105 hundred million (Li, 2004). Investigation showed that output of Green rice occupied 18.3% of total output, Green Xour 0.64%, Green edible vegetable oil 1.54%, Green fruit 1.61%, Green tea 18.3%, Green liquid milk and dairy product 63.5% at the beginning of 2004 (Jiang, 2004). Since 1996, Green Food has been divided into grade AA and grade A. Criteria of Grade AA match those of organic food in international market. As a whole, Green Food certiWcation in China include six criteria, which are environmental quality criteria, production process criteria, product criteria, package and label criteria, storage and shipping criteria and other relative criteria, like recommended fertilizer criteria, recommended pesticide criteria, recommended food additive criteria and soil criteria, etc. Food safety consumer assurance systems have two major functions. Firstly, by establishing criteria from environmental quality to package and label, which are higher than those of admittance systems, these systems serve as platforms for the further development of competent food enterprises. Secondly, the systems not only help guide consumption but also help enterprises access to market abroad and occupy more market share at home. For example, Green Food has gained more admittance in international market since 1990s. The exporting value of Green Food increased from USD $2 hundred million making up 2.5% of gross output value of Green Food in 2000 to USD 12.5 hundred million in 2004 making up 14.5% of the gross output value of Green Food in 2004. From 2000 to 2004, the annual growth rate of exporting value of Green Food attained to 131%, increasing 89 points compared with the average growth rate of 42% from 1997 to 2000 (Zhang, 2005). 5. Conclusion Based on analyzing status and origins of China’s food safety and discussing the duties of China’s oYcial food control agencies, the paper mainly compared China’s two kinds of food safety assurance systems from the aspects of market objectives, functions, management modes and resulting constraint forces on food producers.
Chinese government has attached more and more attention to food safety because of the reduced Chinese consumers’ trust in food industry and the loss caused by decreased foodstuV export value. Although data showed that status of food safety in China had changed in a positive direction, the government still faces a serious challenge to assure the safety of food supply. The implementation of QS admittance system helped distinguish safety food from common food and optimized the structure of food market. To make QS system function more eYciently, it is necessary to shape an eYcient regulation procedure against mini-companies and workshops and perfect inspection items to make them comparable with those of international standards. Besides the compulsive admittance system, more and more Chinese food companies have voluntarily implemented food safety consumer assurance systems in order to acquire more competition powers in domestic and international market. Among food safety consumer assurance systems in China, Green Food CertiWcation develops fast, gaining more admittance in international market and becoming more popular in domestic food market. References Chen, X. W., & Deng, N. (2004). China’s National Food Safety Strategy, (pp. 235–249). Beijing: Chemical Industry Press. Gung, H. O. (2003). Research report on China’s food industry, Gung Ho! Group. Beijing, People’s Republic of China. Jeng, H. J., & Fang, T. J. (2003). Food safety control system in Taiwan— the example of food service sector. Food Control, 14, 317–322. Jiang, H. (2004). Green food develops fast. China industry and commerce times, (p. 7). July 15. Li, X. Y. (2004). Market analysis and development tendency of green food in China. Journal of Agricultural Mechanization Research, 2004(1), 6–11. Pan, F. (2005). Hold the pass to assure China’s food safety. People Daily, March 4, p. 3. Whitehead, A. J. (1995). Elements of an eVective national food control system. Food Control, 6(5), 247–251. Xu, B. & Li, X. Q. (2004). Farmer’s way to wealth. China economic times, Feb. 2, p. 4. Yan, J. C., & Yan, T. W. (2004). Countermeasures and advices about enhancing quality and safety management on farm produce in China. China Soft Science, 2004(7), 26. Ye, Y. M. (2004). China’s food safety regulation and development trend. Drug Evaluation, 1(5), 323–329. Yearbook of China’s Food Industry, (1997). Beijing: China Light Industry Press. Zhang, Z. (2005). Green marketing and the improvement of Chinese agrifood’s market power in international market. Group Economics Research, 2005(8), 36–37. Zhang, X. Y., Li, G., & Zhang, L. (2004). Chinese consumers’ concern on food safety. China Rural Survey, 2004(1), 10–17. Zhou, Y. H., Ying, H., Huo, L. Y., & Peng, X. J. (2004). Food safety: attitudes of consumers and purchase will the eVect of information. Chinese Rural Economy, 2004(11), 19–32.
Food safety assurance systems in China Li Bai a
a,¤
, Chenglin Ma a, Shunlong Gong b, Yinsheng Yang
a
College of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, Jilin University, 5988 Renmin Street, Changchun 130025, PR China b College of Management, Jilin University, 5988 Renmin Street, Changchun 130025, PR China Received 4 July 2005; received in revised form 5 December 2005; accepted 9 December 2005
Abstract China’s food industry grows fast since 1980s, with an average annual growth rate over 13%. Likewise the frequent outbreak of foodborne illness in China makes evident the deWciency of food safety assurance systems. The paper discussed food safety assurance systems in China. SpeciWcally, the paper Wrstly introduced China’s food industry, food safety status and origin, food safety regulation agencies, and then compared two kinds of food safety assurance systems applied in China, in particular their market objectives, functions, management modes and resulting constraint forces on food producers, etc. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Food safety; Assurance systems; Regulation; China
1. Introduction With the economic growth and development of populated urbanized centers, Chinese consumers have showed more and more interest in food quality and safety. Likewise the frequent outbreaks of foodborne illness in China made evident the urgent need for more eYcient food safety assurance systems. The aim of the paper is to introduce food safety assurance systems in China, whose food industry has grown fast since 1980’s with an average annual growth rate of over 13%. Whitehead (1995), senior oYcer of Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, argued that an eVective food control systems were composed of food law, national food control strategy and food control agencies and their services. Huei-Yann Joann Jeng and Fang (2003) introduced Taiwan’s food safety control systems by taking food service sector as an example, and introduced that Taiwan’s Department of Health was the major food control agency, and was actively expanding HACCP in Taiwan’s
*
Corresponding author. Tel./fax: +86 431 509 5442. E-mail address: [email protected] (L. Bai).
0956-7135/$ - see front matter © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.foodcont.2005.12.005
food service sector to increase the competitive power of Taiwan food industry in international market. Development Research Center of the State Council of PR China organized researchers from more than 50 organizations and conducted a research on China’s National Food Safety Strategy (Chen & Deng, 2004). The research introduced China’s food safety issues from diVerent aspects in the round and put forward strategic and median and long-term development plans for China’s national food safety system. Based on the above research results, the paper introduced China’s food safety assurance systems speciWcally and thoroughly. 2. Status of food safety in China 2.1. Food industry in China Based on the “Food Sanitation Law of PR China”, a basic law on food safety in China, food is deWned as “Wnished products and materials that are edible and drinkable for people, including those which belong to both food and medicines in a traditional sense, but not including those used for treatment”. According to Third National Industrial Census of China, China’s food industry comprises salt
L. Bai et al. / Food Control 18 (2007) 480–484
mining industry, food processing industry, food manufacturing industry, drinking manufacturing industry and tobacco processing industry (Yearbook of China’s Food Industry, 1997). Compared with the industry in developed countries, China’s food industry still underdeveloped since the output value of China’s food industry mealy equaled to 30% of the output value of agriculture and among the value of consumed food, processed food merely occupied 30% in 2004 (Xu & Li, 2004). However, China’s food industry developed very fast, with an annual growth rate of 13.5% from 1980 to 2004, and provided the most employment among all the industries. According to the preliminary data published by National Development and Reform Commission of PR China, the output value of food industry attained to about USD $1971 hundred million in 2004, standing Wrst in sequent 11 years among all industries in China. According to statistics, among the total output value of China’s food processing and manufacturing industries in 2003, the output value of large and middle-sized enterprises attained to RMB 3502 hundred million, comprising 41.9% of the total output value (Gung, 2003). 2.2. Status of food safety in China According to the bulletin of China’s Ministry of Health (MOH), 2305 cases on serious food poisoning accidents were received during 2004, 42,876 persons involved and 255 persons died. Compared with the bulletin of 2003, the cases, involved persons and died persons increased respectively 55.6%, 44.9% and ¡0.03%. In 2004, the reasons of food poisoning were microbe contamination (making up 58.1% of all poisoning persons), chemical contamination (making up 16.6% of all poisoning persons, but 58.5% of all died persons), poisonous animals and plants (making up 9.4% of all poisoning persons) and others. Table 1 shows the serious food poisoning cases issued by MOH from 2001 to 2004. One reason for the sharp increase of food poisoning cases in 2003 and 2004 is the stricter regulation, which makes more food poisoning cases exposed. Although the data in Table 1 showed an upward tendency of the food poisoning cases, China’s food safety situation is actually changing in a positive way considering the fact that the qualiWed rate of food product in national sampling check was 88.1% in 2001, 89.5% in 2002, 90.5% in 2003 and 89.8% in 2004 (Yan & Yan, 2004). However, the result of random Table 1 Serious Food poisoning cases issued by MOH from 2001 to 2004 Year
Food poisoning cases
Involved persons
Died persons
2001a 2002a 2003a 2004b
624 464 1481 2305
20,124 11,572 29,600 42,876
143 68 262 255
a
Source of data: Statistical Bulletin of China’s Health Service (2001– 2003), MOH, http://www.moh.gov.cn/tjxxzx/tjsj/tjgb/index.htm. b Source of data: Document [2005] No. 58 issued by Ministry of Health.
481
test on more than 2000 kinds of food products made by China’s Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) in 2003 showed that the average up-to-standard rate was 82.1% and the average up-to-standard rate of food products produced by small-sized enterprises was merely 76.2% (www.aqsiq.gov.cn), which showed that China still faced serious food safety situation even though it was changing in a positive way. In addition, China’s Consumers’ Association proclaimed that in 2004 they totally received 52,249 complaints including 1811 cases on food safety, with an increase of 11.7% compared with those of 2003 (http://www.cca.org.cn/). Consumers’ main complaints focused on containing deleterious materials, doping foreign matters and exceeding shield life. Doping foreign matters is rarely complained in developed countries because most kinds of food are processed in an enclosed way there. However, quite a bit of food is processed by manual work in China, therefore doping foreign matters is very common, especially when workers are not practiced. Reviewing China’s food safety accidents, such as polished grains with mineral oil, fake milk powder in Fuyang city and poisonous wine in Guangzhou city, we can conclude that China’s food safety accidents were caused by two factors. The Wrst factor lies in contaminated raw materials, that is, raw materials contain toxic ingredient or zoonosis pathogens, and the second factor lies in insuYcient sanitation control and the introduction of foreign matters during food processing like food additives and eyewinkers. As a whole, food producers have three direct purposes to produce unsafe food. First, to reduce production costs by using inferior materials or by decreasing dosages, fake milk power in Fuyang City and poisonous wine in Guangzhou city are typical examples. Second to beautify product’s surface and make it attractive, typical examples are dipping hams with dichlorvos and smoking vermicelli with nitrate. Third, to change products’ certain characters like extending shelf life by using food additives or adopting improper manufacturing and packaging process. Consumers can directly judge whether a product is cheap or specious but cannot judge whether it is safe or not. So, food producers’ Wnal aim of reducing production costs, beautifying product’s surface and changing certain product characters is to earn more proWts. When ex ante food standards are not perfect and ex post punitive measures are not severe and eYcient, for example, when higher communication costs among regulation agencies and lack of sophisticated detection facilities make food safety management diYcult, producers will possibly give in the safety character which may be detected and pursue the more direct characters of low price and specious surface. 3. Functions of China’s oYcial food regulation agencies China’s food safety is regulated by eight oYcial agencies, Department of Agriculture (DA), Ministry of Public Security (MPS), Board of Trade (BOT), Ministry of Health
482
L. Bai et al. / Food Control 18 (2007) 480–484
Table 2 Food safety regulation agencies and duties Regulation link
Main food safety problems in the link
Regulation agency
Assistant regulation agencies
Planting and feeding
Planting: pollution of fertilizes and pesticides; Feeding: contamination of animal remedies and foodstuV additives Food additives; Foreign materials being introduced during processing; Sanitation authorization Counterfeit and inferior product; False publicity Sanitation authorization; Improper food prepare process and unscientiWc consuming habit, such as cross-contamination etc.
DA
EPA, MPS, SFDAa
AQSIQ
MOH, AIC, BT, EPA, MPS, SFDAa
AIC MOH
BOT, BOT, MPS, SFDAa AIC, BT, MPS, SFDAa
Processing Circulating Consuming
a
SFDA, an department directly under State Department of China, was established on the basis of State Drug Administration in March of 2003. SFDA are responsible for general supervision and harmonization for the regulation of food, health products and cosmetics, and for prosecuting serious food safety accidents.
(MOH), Administration for Industry and Commerce (AIC), Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ), State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA), Environment Protection Agency (EPA), all of them directly under the lead of State Council of China. Before 2004, duties of these regulation agencies overlapped and intercrossed largely, therefore State Council of China issued an Act named “Decision on Further Enhancing Food Safety Management” in 2004 to harmonious food safety regulation agencies. Based on the Act, diVerent regulation agencies are assigned to control diVerent links of food supply chain rather than diVerent kinds of food products, which is diVerent with the regulation styles of some countries, such as America. Table 2 summed up the functions of China’s food safety regulation agencies. DA is responsible for regulating the link of primary agricultural products, AQSIQ for manufacturing and processing, AIC for circulation, MOH for food consumption and SFDA for general supervising, harmonizing, and investigating and prosecuting serious food safety accidents.
ity system and HACCP system etc., which are implemented by producers in a voluntary way. The purpose of these systems is to satisfy consumers’ demands for higher quality in food market. In common, product standards of these systems are stricter than those of QS system. So according to the diVerence of government’s control forces on food producers, China’s food safety assurance systems can be divided into two broad headings: (1) food safety admittance systems, implemented by oYcial regulation agencies throughout China in a compulsive way, aiming to satisfy the public’s basic demands for consuming safety food; (2) food safety consumer assurance systems, implemented by producers in a voluntary way, aiming to satisfy consumers’ demands for higher quality and to acquire more admittance in international market. Table 3 compared the two systems’ diVerence from the areas of market objectives, management styles, constraint force on producers, etc.
4. Food safety assurance systems applied in China
The primary function of compulsive food safety admittance system in China, such as QS system, is to boost up consumers’ conWdence in China’s food industry. Investigation showed that more than half of Chinese consumers were “worried” about China’s food safety status and almost half of respondents considered that food in Chinese market was not so safe as it was (Zhang, Li, & Zhang, 2004; Zhou, Ying, Huo, & Peng, 2004). In such a condition, Chinese government implemented QS system to save consumers’ conWdence in China’s food industry since consumers’ distrust not only made the social welfare decrease because many consumers contracted their food choice category by removing uncertain food from their shopping list but also made a negative eVect on the sustainable development of China’s food industry. The second function of compulsive food safety admittance systems is to optimize the structure of China’s food industry. Taking QS system as an example, food sold in the market without admittance marks (QS) and (or) forging admittance marks will be conWscated, and the production
Foundation of China’s food safety assurance systems is “Food Quality Safety Market Access System (QS System)”, which is implemented by AQSIQ throughout China in a compulsive way. AQSIQ marks a tag of “QS (ABB of Quality Safety)” on food products passed tests of AQSIQ or its aYliated agencies. The tag of QS is not only an admission ticket to market but also an important marker for consumers to discern products safe or not. Among the 28 kinds of food in China, Wve essential kinds of rice, wheat Xour, edible oil, sauce and vinegar were implemented QS system in 2003; most of the 10 primary kinds food, such as meat products, dairy products, convenience food, fast-frozen food, soft drinks, condiment, puVed food, etc. were implemented QS system in 2004; and all of the 28 kinds of food will have implemented the QS system by the end of 2006. Besides QS System, there are still other food safety assurance systems, such as Green Food certiWcation, Organic food certiWcation, China’s Brand-name Product, ISO qual-
4.1. Compulsive food safety admittance systems
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Table 3 China’s food safety assurance systems Broad headings
Market objectives
Constrained force on producers
Typical system
Contents
Management modes
Food safety admittance systems
Satisfy the public’s demands for safety food
Compulsively implemented in food industry through China by AQSIQ
Food Quality Safety Market Access System
License system for food production; Compulsive product test before leaving factory; Mark a tag on products passed tests
Food safety consumer assurance systems
Satisfy the demands of higher income consumers and acquire more admittance in international market
Voluntarily implemented in food industry under consumers’ further demands
Green Food certiWcation; Organic Food certiWcation; China’s Brand-name Products; HACCP system; ISO system
Environmental standard of producing area; Processing, packaging, storing and shipping standards; Final product standards; Complete records on processing and distributing; Trademark management
Random sample test; Inspect major products; special inspect on certain products; Patrolling, revisiting, annually censoring and spot-checking food enterprises; punishment Third party certiWcation; Exemption from inspection during valid date; Inspect under the demands of producers and consumers
license of these producers will be revoked. Therefore the implementation of food safety admittance systems compels a lot of individual workshops under worse operating conditions to wash out from market and keeps legal food producers away from the negative inXuence of illegal food producers like pretenders. Although the implementation of QS System aims to assure consumers of the reliability of food quality, some Xaws in the system itself and in its enforcement process make it ineYcient. First, are products producing by qualiWed food producers surely the products that can be safely consumed? According to QS system, food producers that have obtained sanitation authorization and possessed necessary production and inspection facilities required by QS system must send sample products to legal agencies to test and decide whether the products can enter market with a mark of QS on package or not. However, because of the shortage of funds, inspection equipments and inspectors, most inspect items are less than those of industrialized countries. Take rice as an example, Japan’s regulation agencies check 132 items while agencies in China only check over 10 items. What’s more, incomplete credit system and lacking of wash-out system in China make a lot of food companies lose motive to continue upgrading product’s quality after acquiring market admittance, and even the enterprises with favorable working conditions may choose to ease their quality control to reduce production costs. Secondly, QS System focuses on large and middle-sized enterprises too much. One objective of AQSIQ is that the large and middle-sized food enterprises that acquired “QS” admittance attain to 90% among all of the large and
middle ones (http://www.china.org.cn). However, ad hoc survey conducted by AQSIQ from 2001 to 2003 showed that 70% of China’s food enterprises were some kinds of workshops with less than 10 workers (Pan, 2005). Therefore, the means of enforcement like “managing large while easing small” cannot completely wash out the 70% workshops from food market. Although the production value of the 70% only occupies 5% of total food production value (Ye, 2004), most false and inferior food, like fake milk power in Fuyang city and poisonous wine in Guangzhou city, were products of those workshops. Anymore, most of the workshops locate in the juncture of urban and rural, where the residents earn less, receive little education and prefer the cheaper rather than the safer, and more easily be hurt. 4.2. Voluntary food safety consumer assurance systems Aims of voluntary food safety consumer assurance systems are to satisfy the demands for higher quality products of domestic consumers with higher income and to acquire more admittance in international market. In China, these kinds of systems mainly include Green Food CertiWcation system, Organic Food CertiWcation system and China’s Brand-name Product authorization, HACCP system and ISO management system, the last two mainly focusing on the process management while the others mainly focusing on performances of Wnal products. Here we take Green Food CertiWcation system, which becomes more and more popular in China food market, as an example to analyze the function of voluntary food safety consumer assurance systems.
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Green Food certiWcation has been implemented in China since 1990, under the charge of National Green Product Development Center of DA and its aYliated Green Food OYces in each province. With the popularity of Green Food in China, up to the end of 2004, enterprises gained Green Food certiWcation attained to 2836, and the varieties of Green Food attained to 6496 in China market, with gross output of 46,000 million ton and sales value of more than $105 hundred million (Li, 2004). Investigation showed that output of Green rice occupied 18.3% of total output, Green Xour 0.64%, Green edible vegetable oil 1.54%, Green fruit 1.61%, Green tea 18.3%, Green liquid milk and dairy product 63.5% at the beginning of 2004 (Jiang, 2004). Since 1996, Green Food has been divided into grade AA and grade A. Criteria of Grade AA match those of organic food in international market. As a whole, Green Food certiWcation in China include six criteria, which are environmental quality criteria, production process criteria, product criteria, package and label criteria, storage and shipping criteria and other relative criteria, like recommended fertilizer criteria, recommended pesticide criteria, recommended food additive criteria and soil criteria, etc. Food safety consumer assurance systems have two major functions. Firstly, by establishing criteria from environmental quality to package and label, which are higher than those of admittance systems, these systems serve as platforms for the further development of competent food enterprises. Secondly, the systems not only help guide consumption but also help enterprises access to market abroad and occupy more market share at home. For example, Green Food has gained more admittance in international market since 1990s. The exporting value of Green Food increased from USD $2 hundred million making up 2.5% of gross output value of Green Food in 2000 to USD 12.5 hundred million in 2004 making up 14.5% of the gross output value of Green Food in 2004. From 2000 to 2004, the annual growth rate of exporting value of Green Food attained to 131%, increasing 89 points compared with the average growth rate of 42% from 1997 to 2000 (Zhang, 2005). 5. Conclusion Based on analyzing status and origins of China’s food safety and discussing the duties of China’s oYcial food control agencies, the paper mainly compared China’s two kinds of food safety assurance systems from the aspects of market objectives, functions, management modes and resulting constraint forces on food producers.
Chinese government has attached more and more attention to food safety because of the reduced Chinese consumers’ trust in food industry and the loss caused by decreased foodstuV export value. Although data showed that status of food safety in China had changed in a positive direction, the government still faces a serious challenge to assure the safety of food supply. The implementation of QS admittance system helped distinguish safety food from common food and optimized the structure of food market. To make QS system function more eYciently, it is necessary to shape an eYcient regulation procedure against mini-companies and workshops and perfect inspection items to make them comparable with those of international standards. Besides the compulsive admittance system, more and more Chinese food companies have voluntarily implemented food safety consumer assurance systems in order to acquire more competition powers in domestic and international market. Among food safety consumer assurance systems in China, Green Food CertiWcation develops fast, gaining more admittance in international market and becoming more popular in domestic food market. References Chen, X. W., & Deng, N. (2004). China’s National Food Safety Strategy, (pp. 235–249). Beijing: Chemical Industry Press. Gung, H. O. (2003). Research report on China’s food industry, Gung Ho! Group. Beijing, People’s Republic of China. Jeng, H. J., & Fang, T. J. (2003). Food safety control system in Taiwan— the example of food service sector. Food Control, 14, 317–322. Jiang, H. (2004). Green food develops fast. China industry and commerce times, (p. 7). July 15. Li, X. Y. (2004). Market analysis and development tendency of green food in China. Journal of Agricultural Mechanization Research, 2004(1), 6–11. Pan, F. (2005). Hold the pass to assure China’s food safety. People Daily, March 4, p. 3. Whitehead, A. J. (1995). Elements of an eVective national food control system. Food Control, 6(5), 247–251. Xu, B. & Li, X. Q. (2004). Farmer’s way to wealth. China economic times, Feb. 2, p. 4. Yan, J. C., & Yan, T. W. (2004). Countermeasures and advices about enhancing quality and safety management on farm produce in China. China Soft Science, 2004(7), 26. Ye, Y. M. (2004). China’s food safety regulation and development trend. Drug Evaluation, 1(5), 323–329. Yearbook of China’s Food Industry, (1997). Beijing: China Light Industry Press. Zhang, Z. (2005). Green marketing and the improvement of Chinese agrifood’s market power in international market. Group Economics Research, 2005(8), 36–37. Zhang, X. Y., Li, G., & Zhang, L. (2004). Chinese consumers’ concern on food safety. China Rural Survey, 2004(1), 10–17. Zhou, Y. H., Ying, H., Huo, L. Y., & Peng, X. J. (2004). Food safety: attitudes of consumers and purchase will the eVect of information. Chinese Rural Economy, 2004(11), 19–32.