Chili powder and any food products containing Sudan III, an industrial dye banned in food in Taiwan, must be removed from shelves and recalled, and companies or restaurants that have used tainted ingredients must proactively recall their products and report them to the local health department, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said yesterday.
As batches of chili powder imported from China containing the carcinogenic Sudan III have been found since last month, product tracing along supply chains to find the sources and the affected food products have widened, and dozens of food products are being recalled across the nation.
As of yesterday, a total of 22 batches of chili powder — 21 imported from China and one from Vietnam — have been found to contain Sudan III, and 162,862.7kg of products have been sealed or removed from shelves since last month, FDA data showed.
Photo: Hsu Li-chuan, Taipei Times
The agency called an emergency meeting yesterday afternoon, inviting 55 food industry associations to discuss self-management methods for food companies.
Participants at the meeting agreed on three main points: blocking illegal products at national borders, implementing self-management and proactively reporting suspected illegal products, FDA Deputy Director Lin Chin-fu (林金富) said.
The agency has since March 1 tightened inspection rules, immediately suspending imports when food products containing illegal harmful substances are found at the border or during market inspections, he said.
It has also asked food companies to practice self-management, including proactively removing Sudan III-tainted chili powder and food products from shelves and recalling them.
If food companies or restaurants found that the ingredients or products they sell might contain tainted chili powder, they must also proactively remove them from shelves, recall them and report them to the local health department.
Meanwhile, the Kaohsiung District Prosecutors’ Office on Saturday traced one of the sources of the Sudan III-tainted chili power from China to a Taiwanese businessman Lee Yen-ting (李彥廷), who imported them through 10 companies in Taiwan and one in China established under the names of his relatives or friends, with several of the companies registered under the same address.
Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) yesterday said that he would ask the Ministry of Justice to thoroughly investigate the case, including the company, to prevent unscrupulous businesspeople from using different company names to import illegal products.
Separately, the Kaohsiung Department of Health on Sunday said that in addition to the eight batches of tainted chili powder that were previously detected, Gin Zhan International Co (津棧國際貿易) had imported another batch of tainted chili powder for production and sales, and that a total of 21,035kg of the chili powder and products had been sold to companies in nine cities and counties, including Taipei.
Among the companies, 8,988kg of the tainted chili powder was sold to Golden Howard Foods Trading Co (金福華食品貿易) in Nantou County, which was used to produce 55 types of food products, including shacha sauce (沙茶醬).
Taipei Department of Health Commissioner Chen Yen-yuan (陳彥元) yesterday said the department would proactively inspect companies that had previously failed inspections for food containing Sudan III over the past five years, and if tainted products were found to have been produced or sold in Taipei, it would assist affected companies and restaurants in removing them from shelves.
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