A producer of frozen dumplings in north China's Hebei Province
has suspended production over suspicions that its dumpling exports
to Japan could have caused a mysterious food poisoning
outbreak.
Tianyang Food Co. halted production on Wednesday afternoon and
its products are being recalled, said officials with Hebei
Provincial Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau.
Company sources are not immediately available for comment.
At least 10 people in Japan's Hyogo and Chiba prefectures
reported stomach ache, vomiting or diarrhoea after eating the
dumplings, according to Japanese media.
The Japanese government, after examining the vomit of the
poisoned people and the food packages left at their houses, found
enough methamidophos, a pesticide substance, to poison humans, said
Wang Daning, head of the Bureau of Import and Export Food Safety
under the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection
and Quarantine.
Yet tests by Japanese authorities on the rest of the dumplings
of the same batches sold in Japan, totaling more than 2,000 packs,
were safe, so were all the other types of products made by the same
company in Hebei, Wang said.
The administration said it conducted tests on samples of the
same batches of frozen dumplings and no trace of pesticide remains
was found.
Tests on the raw materials being used by the factory such as
flour ginger, cabbage and packing material showed they were also
safe.
Tianyang Food Co. has a history of 30 years. Its products are
sold only to Japan.
(Xinhua News Agency February 2, 2008)
