The government is to put on hold a planned easing of a ban on food imports from five Japanese prefectures amid public misgivings about food safety, Executive Yuan spokesman Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇) said yesterday.
Hsu said at a news conference that the Cabinet has to establish a sound inspection and management mechanism before talking about easing the ban.
Hsu said that Premier Lin Chuan (林全) has stressed the importance of “rebuilding public trust in the government’s management of food safety,” after presiding over a cross-agency meeting on Wednesday.
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
“Without a sound inspection and management mechanism, there can be no question of such an opening,” Hsu quoted Lin as saying.
Taiwan banned food imports from Japan’s Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma and Chiba prefectures in the wake of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant disaster following a massive earthquake and tsunami in Japan on March 11, 2011.
Several brands of natto (fermented soy beans) containing packets of soy sauce allegedly from Chiba and Ibaraki prefectures were reportedly found in Taiwan this week.
Hsu said that although food products from Fukushima and its surrounding prefectures are banned, there are composite packaging foods, such as condiment sachets in packets of instant noodles, that have not been subjected to the ban.
“The government will review the issue and plug any loopholes,” Hsu said.
Before establishing a sound management mechanism, the government will not make a decision, “and there is no timetable for any such opening,” Hsu said.
Three more public hearings on the import ban are scheduled, Hsu said, adding that holding the hearings is important because they help to establish a model for future public hearings and help clarify information, as the public has heard many rumors.
The public hearings are to be presided over by civic groups rather than government officials in a bid to gather public opinion on the issue, he said, adding that the findings would be passed on to the government.
Hsu Fu (許輔), director of the Executive Yuan’s food safety office, said that all questions raised by the groups would be discussed and clarified.
The Cabinet held 10 public hearings across Taiwan from Nov. 12 to Nov. 14 after announcing them on Nov. 10, but critics saw them as essentially for show to pave the way for lifting the ban.
Questions were raised about why the government seemed in such a rush to hold the hearings, with some hearings ending in disarray amid protests.
Hsu said that if the public is dissatisfied after the three public hearings, the government will review the contentious points and if an effective food safety plan cannot be agreed upon, “it will not rule out the possibility of maintaining the current ban.”
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