BEIJING, Aug. 17 (Xinhua) -- China issued a white paper on food safety Friday with a pledge to prevent the export of substandard food.
The first of its kind, the 29-page white paper released by the information office of the State Council provides a brief introduction of food production and quality, the food supervision system, imports and exports, as well as international exchanges and cooperation on food safety.
"The issuing of the white paper is right on time," said Luo Yunbo, dean of food science and nutriology engineering school of China's Agricultural University.
Professor Luo held that China's exported food safety could be guaranteed, as the authorities operated the strictest quarantine standard over exported food.
According to the white paper, the acceptance rate of Chinese foodstuffs exported to the EU stood at 99.8 percent in the first half, followed by those exported to the United States, with the acceptance rate of 99.1 percent.
A report from Japan shows that Japan conducted more sample surveys on Chinese food (15.7 percent) than on food from anywhere else, but Chinese food had the highest acceptance rate (99.42 percent), followed by that imported from the EU (99.38 percent) and the United States. (98.69 percent).
Li Changjiang, head of China's General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, said the recent food safety issues had no effect on exports.
He said Chinese agricultural products exported to the United States were up 28.7 percent in first half of this year over the same period in 2006, and that to the EU increased by 23.6 percent.
A complete supervision system over exported goods had been established, Li said.
In order to control the risks of animal epidemics, plant diseases and pesticides and veterinary medicine residues, the government had adopt a record management system for food material bases.
The white paper pointed out food must be quarantined before export. If it is demanded by the importing country, the quarantine authorities should issue a hygiene certificate, and enter on the certificate the name, address, hygiene registration number of the producing enterprise, date of production, date of export, loading port and destination port.
All enterprises must be granted a hygiene registration before engaging in the production of food for export.
As regards large companies producing or processing high-risk export food such as meat, the entry-exit inspection and quarantine authorities would send resident officials to supervise when needed. The packaging of export food should be labeled with traceable signs according to requirements, so as to ensure the trace ability of the products and recall of substandard products.
Companies that severely violated regulations or avoided quarantine inspections would face fines and entry on an Internet blacklist. So far, 55 enterprises have been included on the List of Unlawful Enterprises.
The white paper admitted a few Chinese companies avoided quarantine inspections by means of fraud, and exported their goods through illegal channels, which resulted in fake, inferior, or adulterated food going abroad.
Professor Luo said food safety was a global issue, but China's food safety issues were exaggerated maliciously in the hope of setting up trade barriers.
Gao Hucheng, Vice Commerce Minister, said sensationalized reports were de facto trade protectionism.
The white paper stressed that China was willing to work with other countries on the international food trade.
