FDA limits Chinese food additive imports By Elizabeth Weise and Julie Schmit, USA TODAY
The Food and Drug Administration is enforcing a new import alert that greatly expands its curtailment of some food ingredients imported from China, authorizing border inspectors to detain ingredients used in everything from noodles to breakfast bars.
The new restriction is likely to cause delays in the delivery of raw ingredients for the production of many commonly used products.
STORY: U.S. food imports outrun FDA resources
GRAPHIC: Some imported food rejected (interactive map)
The move reflects the FDA's growing unease with what the alert announcement called China's "manufacturing control issues" and that country's inability to ascertain what controls are in place to prevent food contamination. For example, the agency says that, after weeks of investigation, it still does not know what regions of China are affected or what firms there are major manufacturers of vegetable proteins.
Inspectors are now allowed to detain vegetable-protein imports from China because they may contain the chemical melamine. Melamine, used in the manufacture of plastics, was found in the wheat gluten and rice protein concentrate that has led to the recall of 5,300 pet food products.
Melamine's effects on humans, if ingested, is unclear. In fact, the chemical has not been found in earlier tests to be highly toxic, a fact that has scientists looking for second chemical agent that could be increasing its toxicity.
The agency for the first time also said it has received reports, which it has yet to confirm, that approximately 1,950 cats and 2,200 dogs died after eating contaminated food. The only number of pet deaths that the FDA has confirmed thus far is 14.
An import alert of this breadth is rare. Before this new FDA action, only products from two Chinese companies that exported the melamine-tainted wheat gluten and rice protein concentrate had been detained.
Now for the products to reach U.S. foodmakers, the importers will have to prove to the FDA that they are safe. The ingredients restricted include wheat gluten, rice gluten, rice protein, rice protein concentrate, corn gluten, corn gluten meal, corn by-products, soy protein, soy gluten, mung-bean protein and amino acids.
The FDA has not reported finding melamine in food imports for humans from China, yet it last week launched sample testing "out of an abundance of caution," said chief medical officer David Acheson.
The new restriction may be what's needed to shore up consumer confidence that the FDA can protect the food supply, said Jean Kinsey, director of the Food Industry Center at the University of Minnesota. Without such action, the public's distrust will grow, she said.
According to the alert notice posted on the FDA website Friday, the agency has so far taken 750 samples of wheat gluten and products made with wheat gluten and found 330 positive for melamine or melamine combined with another substance. It also found 27 positives out of 85 samples of rice protein concentrate and products made with rice protein concentrate.
All of the samples that tested positive were imported from China.
"I don't believe it has reached such a serious stage that human food is at risk," Wu Yongning, Deputy Director of the National Institute of Nutrition and Food Safety, part of China's Ministry of Health, said in Beijing. "Problems occur in all countries."
"Generally speaking, American consumers should not worry too much," said Luo Yunbo, Head of the Food Science and Nutrition Engineering Institute at China's Agricultural University in Beijing. "We select the best products for the international markets." Asian giant grappels with food safety probe WUDI COUNTY, China — The headquarters of Binzhou Futian Bio-Technology are sealed, and local residents say its production sites were quiet last week.
The inactivity is government imposed, a physical sign of Chinese authorities' determination to tackle a food-safety crisis in which this nation's growing food industry is cast in a leading role.
On Thursday, after weeks of official denial, China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed U.S. Food and Drug Administration charges that melamine, a chemical used in plastics and fertilizer, was found in rice protein concentrate exported by Binzhou Futian and in wheat gluten exported by Xuzhou Anying in Jiangsu Province.
Both ingredients were used in millions of bags and cans of pet food made in the USA, and some made its way into livestock feed. Product recalls include cat and dog foods sold under more than 100 brand names in the USA.
Chinese police closed the company's headquarters Wednesday, a day after the provincial quality supervision bureau sealed the premises by pasting paper strips across the doors of the eight ground-floor rooms that Binzhou Futian rents from the county grain bureau. Wudi County is in Shandong Province, a five-hour drive southeast of Beijing.
Binzhou Futian's headquarters are in a four-story building in a low-rise town of 440,000 people. They are modest accommodations for a firm that claimed, on its now-dormant website, to employ 457 people, have fixed assets of $6.5 million, and export 90% of its products, mostly corn- and rice-based protein and animal feed. They also highlight the challenge that China faces in regulating a food-processing industry, dominated by millions of small players, that now feeds the world.
"We are still a developing country, and we have a small-scale farm economy," said Wu Yongning, deputy director of the National Institute of Nutrition and Food Safety, under the Chinese Center for Disease Control in Beijing.
"In agricultural production, a single farm or family is often a foodstuffs factory or enterprise. This is a problem that other large economies don't have," Wu said.
Binzhou Futian is a classic example of a single Chinese entrepreneur pursuing his dream in a once-centrally planned economy that only recently opened its doors to private enterprise.
The founder, Tian Feng, who could not be reached for comment, built his firm by processing, thus adding value to the region's agricultural wealth.
In Wudi last week, the only people aware of any problem at Binzhou Futian were representatives from the two dozen local animal feed producers who were called Tuesday to an emergency government meeting.
"I am confident the government can deal with this problem," said Liu Jincheng, manager of Wudi Liuhe Xinyang Animal Feed Co., a branch of China's third-largest animal-feed maker.
"President Hu Jintao signed an order requiring strict handling of this matter. Officials asked us for details of all our raw material suppliers, but I don't fear their inspections, as all our materials come from large, standardized companies."
Binzhou Futian told its U.S. client Wilbur-Ellis that the contamination occurred through accidental reuse of dirty packaging, according to Wilbur-Ellis President John Thacher. The FDA has said the melamine, a chemical high in nitrogen, might have been added to the grain products to make them appear higher in protein than they were.
Luo Yunbo, head of the Food Science and Nutritional Engineering Institute at China's Agricultural University, said that some Chinese food manufacturers include additives that are inappropriate.
"Sometimes people lack enough knowledge of additives, or even if they do know, they still do it," he said. "The current penalties are very small and should be much heavier. Some companies are fined and then move somewhere else and do it again," he said.
Other experts agreed that China faces a stiff test to stamp out abuses.
"Farmers are always looking for profit, and sometimes they do not meet our national standards. Also, our safety inspection coverage is not yet complete," said Wu, of the food safety institute.
"Contamination can happen occasionally in both animal feed and foodstuffs. If you buy from a local agricultural market, and the goods are put in bags, then we have regulations for the safety of the bag, but does everyone meet those standards?" Wu asked. | China admits tainted food link By Calum MacLeod, USA TODAY
BEIJING — Chinese authorities acknowledged for the first time that ingredients exported to make pet food contained a prohibited chemical, stepping up their probe of two Chinese companies' roles in one of the USA's largest animal-food recalls.
While pledging cooperation with U.S. authorities investigating the recall, the Chinese government in a statement Thursday also disputed that the chemical — melamine, which is used to make plastic — was responsible for harming pets.
IN CHINA: All's quiet in, around offices at core of probe
"There is no clear evidence showing that melamine is the direct cause of the poisoning or death of the pets," the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing argued in a prepared statement. "China is willing to strengthen cooperation with the U.S. side … to find out the real cause leading to the pet deaths in order to protect the health of the pets of the two countries."
In a sign of government urgency, Chinese police two days ago sealed the headquarters of Binzhou Futian Bio-Technology, which exported rice protein concentrate to the USA for use in pet food. Paper strips were pasted across the doors of the eight ground-floor rooms the company rents in Wudi County, a five-hour drive southeast of Beijing.
FIND MORE STORIES IN: Thursday | Chinese | US Food and Drug Administration | Wilbur-Ellis
As inspectors from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration prepare to visit the firms where the ingredients were made, Chinese and American food experts here say China's vast and fragmented food-processing industry makes inspection difficult and increases the likelihood of future problems.
FDA tests identified melamine in imported wheat gluten and rice protein concentrate in pet foods. It also has said cyanuric acid, a chemical related to melamine used in cleaning pools, was found in wheat gluten. The agency has said melamine, a chemical high in nitrogen, might have been added to the grain products to make them appear higher in protein than they were.
Since March 16, cat and dog food sold under more than 100 brand names have been recalled. The FDA has said 14 pets died after eating recalled foods, but anecdotal reports from veterinarians and pet owners point to higher numbers.
President Hu Jintao this week urged officials to intensify work on food safety, a growing concern among consumers in China, where mass poisonings from tainted products are common. Hu called on officials to monitor the entire food-production process and focus on prevention and resolving problems at their source.
That won't be easy, said Luo Yunbo at the College of Food Science and Nutritional Engineering at China Agricultural University, who briefed China's leader Monday on the FDA's role in food safety. "China is such a large country, with such a large population, and agricultural production is by individual farmers on a very small scale," Luo said. "There are so many farmers and food producers that it is a great challenge to inspect all foodstuffs and teach people better agricultural standards."
About 6,000 hogs in eight U.S. states may have been fed pet food made from salvage products that had the tainted rice gluten. The pet food was sold for reformulation before melamine was found. Several hundred hogs may have entered the human food supply, FDA officials said. While there is no tolerance for melamine in food, the FDA's Daniel McChesney said, "we believe the risks to be very low to humans."
Two more recalls were announced Thursday.
Costco Wholesale Corp. announced a recall of its Kirkland Signature Super Premium Lamb and Rice canned dog pet food with sell by dates of Aug. 21 2008 to April 15 of 2009. The food was made by American Nutrition using rice protein concentrate from Wilbur-Ellis, which imported the product from Binzhou Futian in China. Costco will mail 230,000 letters to all members who purchased the canned food on Friday, said Craig Wilson, food safety chief for Costco.
Chenango Valley Pet Foods also has begun voluntarily recalling pet foods manufactured with a certain shipment of rice protein concentrate it received from Wilbur-Ellis, the company said Thursday.
The pet foods were sold to customers in Wisconsin, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, who in turn sold the products to their customers through catalog mail orders or retail outlets.
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