A snowballing pesticide scare yesterday gathered up more tea drink chains as the Taipei Department of Health released results from tests which showed that 24 percent of beverages had excessive pesticide levels.
The department said it tested a total of 25 beverage ingredients for pesticide residues last month, including nine tea products and 16 dried flower or herbal tea products.
While 17 tested positive for pesticide residues, the residue levels in 11 were within government limits. The remaining six products had excessive levels of pesticides and fungicides, namely fipronil, triazophos, dimethomorph, propoxur, dichlorvos and methomyl, the department said.
“The six included jasmine teas used by Coffee Alley (咖啡弄), which contained 0.13 parts per million [ppm] of triazophos, higher than the maximum allowable level of 0.1ppm; chrysanthemum tea buds sold by Dazzling Express, which had 0.06ppm of banned pesticide dichlorvos; and ‘Madam Rose tea’ from Madam Rose Coffee and Tea Salon (玫瑰夫人), which contained the prohibited insecticide methomyl,” Health Food and Drug Division director Wang Ming-li (王明理) told a news conference in Taipei yesterday morning.
Wang said the investigation took an unexpected twist when the department traced Coffee Alley’s jasmine tea leaves back to Kaohsiung’s Ho Yi Trading Co (河億貿易), which said the product was labeled “for incense and bathing use,” before being sold to the coffee shop chain’s upstream suppliers, Taipei’s Lung Yuan (龍源中藥行) and Wang Tai (旺泰中藥行) Chinese herbal medicine pharmacies.
“The pharmacies then marketed the tea leaves as suitable for human consumption. The department is questioning their proprietors to ascertain whether they knowingly tampered with the product’s label. If yes, they could face a maximum fine of NT$3 million [US$97,479],” Wang said.
All six deficient products have been pulled from the shelves and responsible parties could be subject to a fine ranging from NT$60,000 to NT$200 million for violating the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法), the department said.
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