After a reprimand from the Control Yuan for its lax monitoring of organic produce, the Council of Agriculture (COA) has pledged to increase inspections of organic product labels and get tougher on Internet vendors selling organic goods.
The COA was censured by the Control Yuan on Thursday for allowing Yuen Foong Yu Biotech Co, a subsidiary of Yuen Foong Yu Business Group, to sell falsely labeled organic products online.
Control Yuan member Cheng Jen-hung (程仁宏) faulted the council for not putting in place stricter inspections or making improvements to its regulations since news of the Yuen Foong Yu case was reported in February.
The COA responded that it will step up checks on product origin labels, after Yuen Foong Yu was found to label products as being made in Yilan County when they were not.
Director-General of the COA’s Agriculture and Food Agency Chen Wen-deh (陳文德) said the council inspected the labels of 3,934 organic farm products from August last year, with 178 items, or 4.5 percent, failing to meet regulations.
In another random check of 1,046 organic items from January to May, 2.7 percent, or 28 items, were found to fall short of standards.
Chen also said the burgeoning online market has created a real challenge to enforcing organic product regulations because the items are not placed on store shelves.
As part of its initiative to improve overall monitoring, the COA will soon require online vendors to inform customers within a day of any products that fail to meet the regulations.
They must also recall all substandard or improperly labeled products within 10 days and report on the recall process within 15 days.
The council will also launch random checks on organic products every month and publish the results on the Web sites of the affected counties or cities, Chen said.
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