CHINA:PRESIDENT HU Jintao has added his weight to Chinese efforts to resolve a widening scandal over tainted milk when he urged the country's dairy industry to pay more attention to quality control and increase supervision, reports Clifford Coonanin Shanghai.
His comments on state television are a clear signal from the leadership that it is determined to contain the fallout from the scandal over milk products contaminated with the industrial chemical melamine, blamed for sickening some 54,000 children and killing four infants.
"Food safety concerns the health of the public. First, there is a need to improve supervision, second, there needs to be stepped- up quality tests," Mr Hu said, during a visit to milk-processing facilities in Anhui province in the east of the country.
"We need to ensure that all products on the market are up to standard, so that consumers don't have to worry."
The state news agency Xinhua said this week that authorities had detained 22 people accused of involvement in a network that produced, sold and added melamine to milk.
Facing pressure from rising prices, dairy farmers have been trying to boost their output by diluting their milk with water and adding melamine, which shows up as a high-protein reading in tests.
Melamine can cause kidney stones, leading to kidney failure. Infants are particularly vulnerable.
A company at the centre of the scare had asked for government help to cover up the extent of the problem, state media also said yesterday.
In the People's Daily, Shijiazhuang city government spokesman Wang Jianguo said they had been asked by the Sanlu Group for help in "managing" the media response to the case when first told of the issue on August 2nd, six days before the opening of the Olympic Games.
Mr Hu said lessons could be learned from Sanlu Group, the first Chinese dairy company found to be selling contaminated baby formula. Tests later showed that the problem was widespread in the Chinese dairy industry and 22 companies were found to have sold products laced with melamine.
Since melamine-tainted infant formula was uncovered in China, the banned chemical has been found in many food products, forcing a wave of recalls across Asia.
Hong Kong authorities said yesterday that the amount of melamine found in samples of chocolate made at the Beijing factory of British confectioner Cadbury was legally acceptable for human consumption. The company recalled 11 items this week.