China’s Vice Minister of Agriculture recently announced the nation’s goal to “prevent any large-scale food safety crises” in the next year. Chinese authorities have focused food safety efforts since the dairy scandal in 2008. Since China’s food safety law passed last summer, other oversights have sent off waves of public uproar against the government’s faulty safety control.
China is working to improve supervision across all levels of food production – from farms to producers and processors. Regulators struggle with supervising the scattered operations in China’s rural areas while also trying to enforce central government laws on the local level. Nevertheless, the Chinese government has committed to releasing national quality standards for dairy products this year. There will be a clampdown on illegal purchasing stations and severe punishment for the use of banned medications and food additives. Above all, Chinese officials are calling for accountability among responsible actors in order to advance safety in Chinese food products.
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