Noon International: Food Trading Import Export

What’s happening with China Food Safety? 

I cannot comment on all aspects of China Food Safety but I do have a little knowledge of what is happening in the frozen fruit and vegetable business.  Being an importer for many years of product I have witnessed many changes in the production facilities in China.  Today with the help of the Japanese, Europeans, US and others the Chinese factories have learned and raised their standards to the highest international level.

 But more importantly what is happening today in light of the petfood recall, toothpaste recall etc?  Today the suppliers that we as a company use most have at minimum an HACCP program in place, certified by the China authoritites.  We do prefer that the suppliers have a third party audit such as AIB, BRC or others along with the full report and recommendations.  The suppliers that have taken the 3rd party audit have all passed, meaning they have controls in place to monitor the products being produced.  They have incorporated traceback systems to trace product,  they all have HACCP in place to monitor for foreign material, metal detection and microbiological counts are maintained.  Most all of the facilities now have their own equipment for testing for pesticides in house.   Others will send their samples to private or public labs for pesticide testing.  

 All of the above should give some reassurance of the quality of the frozen fruits and vegetables  coming out of China.

 Now after the recalls the CIQ (Inspection and  Quarantine of China) is inspecting all product being shipped to Japan and USA.  This newly enforced  checking is  causing great delays for shipments and how this will work in the long run remains to be seen.  The key is that the China government is taking action and trying to restore confidence to the international community. 

 Lastly, the most important thing is to know whom you are buying from.  I have been to and seen many factories that  we as company would not do business with but the ones we do work with have the quality standards in place and are continually working  to improve there factories.

Technorati Tags: china food saftey, frozen, vegetable, fruit, import

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This entry was posted on Monday, July 23rd, 2007 at 9:37 pm and is filed under China, Food Products, General Trading, Import. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.