More products are falling victim to a scare over Di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate, or DEHP, with Taiwan Sugar Corp (Taisugar, 台糖) saying the withdrawal of a single supplement alone cost it more than NT$10 million (US$346,380) in losses.
The company is recalling “ginger oyster clam tablets” (薑黃蠔蜆錠), which contain lactic acid bacteria to soften ginger.
Raw materials of the acid bacteria were supplied by a company in Changhua County that appeared to be the source of the toxic DEHP, the state-run company said in a statement.
The Changhua firm reportedly added the banned industrial plasticizer to an emulsifier as a substitute for the more expensive palm oil.
Taisugar sent the tablets in for testing, and the result is due today. To ensure product safety, it decided to take proactive measures by withdrawing the supplements from the market — a move that is set to cost it more than NT$10 million, it said.
The sugar supplier also sent four other products in for DEHP testing, saying “fructooligo saccharide lactic acid bacteria” came out positive. It is awaiting for the test results for the other products and will keep consumers posted.
Hey Song Corp (黑松) yesterday said a lactic acid bacteria product in its Fruit House (纖果園) brand also used raw materials from the Changhua supplier, and it was pulling the product from shelves.
Three other suspected products have been temporarily withdrawn pending tests, it said.
These two companies are among 47 local food and beverage makers facing a government recall of potentially contaminated products in connection with the toxic plasticizer.
Yesterday afternoon, the nation’s four major convenience store operators — President Chain Store Corp (統一超商), FamilyMart (全家), OK-Mart and Hi-Life (萊爾富) — pulled all sports drinks from their shelves.
President Chain, which operates 7-Eleven stores, said it received results showing Supau (舒跑), Pocari Sweat (寶礦力水得) and Fin from Hey Song were free of DEHP contamination, and would start putting them back on shelves later in the day.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day