The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) yesterday ordered the recall of 54 of Ting Hsin Oil and Fat Industrial Co’s cooking lard products, following the discovery that the more than 850 tonnes of cooking lard oil the company imported from Vietnam this year was meant for animal use.
“Twenty-three of the recalled products were manufactured by Ting Hsin Oil and Fat this year and 31 were produced last year, all of which could have been tainted with animal feed oil the company procured from Vietnam-based oil manufacturer Dai Hanh Phuc Co,” FDA Interim Director-General Chiang Yu-mei (姜郁美) told a press conference.
Chiang said companies or restaurants that have purchased the 54 kinds of lard-based products are required to notify local health authorities by midnight today and pull the oils or foodstuffs made from it off shelves before the end of Tuesday or face stiff fines.
Photo courtesy of the Pingtung County Government Public Health Bureau
FDA Northern Center for Regional Administration official Wang Te-yuan (王德原) said statistics showed that Ting Hsin Oil and Fat — a Ting Hsin International Group (頂新集團) subsidiary — had acquired a total of 3,216 tonnes of lard from Dai Hanh Phuc since 2012, including 871 tonnes this year, which were falsely listed as “fit for human use” by a Vietnamese notary, Vinacontrol.
Wang said that the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Hanoi forwarded a confirmation from Vietnam’s Ministry of Industry and Trade to the administration on Thursday that the oil currently produced by Dai Hanh Phuc is meant only for animal feed.
“As we are uncertain whether the Vietnamese company used to manufacture cooking oil, it has to be determined whether the so-called ‘cooking lard’ Ting Hsin Oil and Fat bought from the firm before this year was also intended for animal feed,” Wang said.
When asked about Ting Hsin Oil and Fat’s denial that it had prior knowledge of the nature of the imported oil, Chiang simply said: “I believe the veracity of the information provided by the Vietnamese authorities.”
As it is not the first time the FDA has discovered imports of non-edible oil that have been falsely labeled by foreign notary firms, Chiang said her agency is considering only accepting survey reports issued by government authorities for cooking oil purchased overseas in the future.
Greater Kaohsiung-based Chang Guann Co (強冠企業), which was at the center of a recycled waste oil scandal last month, also allegedly fooled the FDA with a document issued by notary company Eagle View Co that falsely listed the industrial lard it procured from Hong Kong-based Globalway Corp Ltd (金寶運貿易) as fit for human consumption.
“Taiwan’s major lard importers include Hong Kong, Vietnam, Spain and Japan, but a ban has been imposed on imports of cooking lard from the first two places, following the discovery of the two false survey report cases,” Chiang said.
Chiang said that with the FDA’s communication efforts, the governments of Spain and Australia, where nearly 95 percent of the nation’s cattle fats are from, have agreed to present official survey documents for their lard and butter exported to Taiwan.
“Our communications with Japan are still underway,” Chiang said, adding that the measure would help ensure the quality of animal oil imports to the country before the FDA decides whether to stop accepting product survey reports issued by notary companies worldwide.
The current regulations require cooking oil importers to present a product survey report issued either by local government authorities or by a private notary office.
If passed, the FDA’s proposed new policy would obligate oil importers to obtain a validation report from their governments before shipping their products to Taiwan.
Regarding the latest developments on the oil scandal involving Cheng I Food Co (正義股份), another subsidiary of Ting Hsin International Group, FDA Northern Center for Regional Administration Deputy Director Hsu Ching-feng (徐錦豐) said that as of 2pm yesterday, about 256,493kg of potentially contaminated products have been removed from shelves nationwide.
“So far, only 133 of the 363 business establishments that have procured Cheng I Food’s 68 kinds of cooking lard products potentially adulterated with animal feed oil have reported back to local health authorities. They could face a maximum fine of NT$3 million (US$100,000) if they fail to pull all the problematic products off shelves before the deadline.”
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