The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) yesterday increased financial rewards to major food safety whistle-blowers to at least 50 percent of the fines levied, in its latest effort to crack down on the nation’s growing number of food adulteration and contamination cases.
Under the new cash award rules, people who provide tips on foods that are adulterated, expired or tainted with illegal additives that are found to involve major irregularities are to receive at least 50 percent of the fines issued, regardless of whether convictions are obtained.
Given that the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法) stipulates fines ranging from NT$60,000 to NT$200 million (US$1,931 to US$6.44 million) for transgressions, food safety whistle-blowers could receive up to NT$100 million in rewards.
Those who expose less serious food irregularities would received rewards of at least 20 percent of the fines collected under the new rules.
In addition, whistle-blowers responsible for bringing severe food safety cases to light would also receive an additional reward ranging from NT$100,000 to NT$2 million.
The reward cap is to be raised to NT$4 million for whistle-blowers currently or formerly employed by implicated firms.
FDA Division of Planning and Research Development official Huang Wei-sheng (黃維生) said that local governments provide different proportions of received fines to whistle-blowers, such as Taichung’s 70 percent, Kaohsiung’s 60 percent, Taoyuan’s 20 to 60 percent, and Taipei and New Taipei City’s 50 percent.
“With the implementation of the new regulations, local health authorities should offer at least 50 percent of the fines to whistle-blowers in major food safety cases and no less than 20 percent to those disclosing minor transgressions,” Huang said.
Financial rewards could be an effective incentive for whistle-blowers, Huang said, referring to a NT$2.4 million reward given to a farmer from Pingtung County.
The farmer’s reports of abnormal activities at a nearby oil factory led to the discovery in September last year that cooking oil manufacturer Chang Guann Co (強冠企業) had used recycled waste oil in some of its lard products, Huang said.
The case affected more than 200 food companies nationwide and prompted consumers to shun lard and even locally manufactured cooking oil products altogether for some time.
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