Food additive manufacturers, processers and importers have been served with a notice by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requiring them to register with health authorities by May 1, the FDA said yesterday.
The move is in accordance with the newly amended Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法).
A string of food scandals involving problematic additives prompted lawmakers to carry out a food law overhaul, aiming to put food additive manufacturers and related businesses on a tighter leash.
The FDA said yesterday that by May 1, food additive manufacturers, processers and importers must complete their registration with health authorities, while the deadline for food additive sellers is Oct. 1.
Another announcement would be made soon to introduce the new regulations on registration details for food additive products, the FDA said.
FDA Deputy Director-General Chiang Yu-mei (姜郁美) said all food additives need to be monitored.
“The amendment [to the Act] allows us to undertake ‘registration management,’ in which all food additive manufacturers, processors or sellers have to register their company names and the services provided,” she said.
“What also needs to be registered are the food additives they [manufacture, process, import or sell]. This is to say that we will have all of the food additives used by the industry and consumed by Taiwanese listed and subject to supervision,” she added.
Chiang said that the new measures would allow the source of substandard food products to be traced quickly in any future incidents of tainted food.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
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