Two companies in Changhua County could be subject to stiff fines if they are confirmed to have imported frozen catfish from Vietnam and then processed and sold it as cod fillets, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said yesterday.
The FDA, working with prosecutors, police and health officials, raided the two firms, Enormous Foods Enterprise Co (光大食品企業社) and Hsiang Tai Fishery Co (祥泰漁業), on Wednesday last week.
FDA Central Center for Regional Administration Director Chiu Hsiu-yi (邱秀儀) said the two companies imported raw and processed frozen catfish from Vietnam to produce fish fillets that were then labeled as “homemade Japanese-style codfish.”
In the raids, investigators also discovered products that had expiration dates of Dec. 30, 2016, even though their preservation period was only one year.
The Changhua District Prosecutors’ Office has begun investigating the two companies for violations of the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法), as well as fraud and document forgery, Chiu said.
Under the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation, false labeling of food or misleading claims are subject to fines of between NT$40,000 and NT$4 million (US$1,213 to US$121,304), and the products involved are to be recalled and cannot be sold until the problem is corrected.
Changhua County Public Health Bureau Director Yeh Yen-po (葉彥伯) said Enormous Foods, a family business, imported 111 tonnes of catfish from Vietnam and produced 100 tonnes of “codfish fillets” for sale to downstream companies.
Yeh said Enormous Foods produced codfish fillets for four companies in Changhua County, New Taipei City, Hsinchu and Taichung.
He said Vietnamese catfish is a freshwater aquaculture fish. It poses no harm to human health and its nutritional value is generally no different from that of other fish, but it costs about a quarter the price of codfish.
Although Enormous Foods argued that it is common practice to market catfish as codfish, officials are tracking the final destinations of its shipments.
Changhua prosecutors have interviewed the head of Enormous Foods, surnamed Lin (林), who has been released on NT$50,000 bail.
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