Germany yesterday announced a ban on a jelling agent, konjac, which has been used in billions of sweets for children.
Konjac, also known as konnyaku, yam flour or glucomannan, is the key material in a childhood sensation known as Mini Fruit Jellys or Mini Fruit Cups that had to be pulled from shelves all over the EU and the US in January.
Served in tiny plastic cups that imitate grown-ups' ready-to-eat meals, the Taiwanese-made sweet is sucked into the mouth to be chewed slowly. However small children were at risk of choking if they swallowed the gel too early.
German Health Minister Renate Kuenast said she had decided to extend the ban from the product to all use of konjac as an ingredient. Sources said EU officials had agreed to a request from Berlin for konjac to be banned soon throughout western Europe.
The German ban is to take effect on Wednesday.
The US Food and Drug Administration said earlier this year there had been reports of four US children's deaths from choking associated with this type of jelly candy. Food safety experts spoke of up to eight deaths in Japan.
It is estimated that one Taiwanese company sold more than 3 billion pieces of the gel snacks.
In August of last year the popular jelly candy imported from Taiwan was pulled from US shelves of hundreds of supermarkets after it was blamed for the choking deaths of two children.
At that time two US grocery store chains -- Safeway and Albertson's -- announced that Jelly Yum brand candies and Fruit Poppers and Gelly Drop candies will be removed from its 2,500 stores nationwide, and bulk-goods store Costco ordered the candies off the shelves of more than 250 stores around the world, including 10 in Asia.
The candy is linked to the deaths of a 3-year-old an a 12-year-old last year in the US. In both cases, rescue workers said they couldn't dislodge the sticky gel from the children's throats.
The gel candies are individually packed in small, soft plastic cups and are sold in bulk in plastic jars.
The brightly colored candies have become popular over the last two years among American children after the treats met with success in Asia.
Health officials have warned the sweet gel does not readily dissolve in the mouth. Some jars carry a label warning that the candies are not safe for children under age 6, while others have said they are not safe for children under age 3.
At least a dozen deaths have been tied to the candy around the world. Most have been in Asia, where the candy originated in 1995. In Japan, the candy has gotten the nickname "deadly mouthful."
The Taichung County-based Sheng Hsiang Jen Foods Co (
"Whether it was a mini-fruity gel, a piece of meat, a hot dog, or any hard candy, the result could have been the same," a company statement on the matter said last year.
IN THE AIR: While most companies said they were committed to North American operations, some added that production and costs would depend on the outcome of a US trade probe Leading local contract electronics makers Wistron Corp (緯創), Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), Inventec Corp (英業達) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶) are to maintain their North American expansion plans, despite Washington’s 20 percent tariff on Taiwanese goods. Wistron said it has long maintained a presence in the US, while distributing production across Taiwan, North America, Southeast Asia and Europe. The company is in talks with customers to align capacity with their site preferences, a company official told the Taipei Times by telephone on Friday. The company is still in talks with clients over who would bear the tariff costs, with the outcome pending further
WEAKER ACTIVITY: The sharpest deterioration was seen in the electronics and optical components sector, with the production index falling 13.2 points to 44.5 Taiwan’s manufacturing sector last month contracted for a second consecutive month, with the purchasing managers’ index (PMI) slipping to 48, reflecting ongoing caution over trade uncertainties, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The decline reflects growing caution among companies amid uncertainty surrounding US tariffs, semiconductor duties and automotive import levies, and it is also likely linked to fading front-loading activity, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said. “Some clients have started shifting orders to Southeast Asian countries where tariff regimes are already clear,” Lien told a news conference. Firms across the supply chain are also lowering stock levels to mitigate
NEGOTIATIONS: Semiconductors play an outsized role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development and are a major driver of the Taiwan-US trade imbalance With US President Donald Trump threatening to impose tariffs on semiconductors, Taiwan is expected to face a significant challenge, as information and communications technology (ICT) products account for more than 70 percent of its exports to the US, Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said on Friday. Compared with other countries, semiconductors play a disproportionately large role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development, Lien said. As the sixth-largest contributor to the US trade deficit, Taiwan recorded a US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US last year — up from US$47.8 billion in 2023 — driven by strong
RESHAPING COMMERCE: Major industrialized economies accepted 15 percent duties on their products, while charges on items from Mexico, Canada and China are even bigger US President Donald Trump has unveiled a slew of new tariffs that boosted the average US rate on goods from across the world, forging ahead with his turbulent effort to reshape international commerce. The baseline rates for many trading partners remain unchanged at 10 percent from the duties Trump imposed in April, easing the worst fears of investors after the president had previously said they could double. Yet his move to raise tariffs on some Canadian goods to 35 percent threatens to inject fresh tensions into an already strained relationship, while nations such as Switzerland and New Zealand also saw increased
RSS