China Again Caught Using Dangerous Ingredients

[sharkman]

A poisonous chemical has been found in Chinese manufactured toothpaste, and it will now be stopped at the border.

China's food safety problems have in recent months become a matter of international concern, a situation reflected in trade talks between Chinese and U.S. officials in Washington last week.

Most notably, on March 15, FDA learned that certain pet foods were sickening and killing cats and dogs. FDA found contaminants in vegetable proteins imported into the United States from China and used as ingredients in pet food.

Officials said they are primarily concerned about toothpaste sold at bargain retail outlets. The ingredient in question, called DEG, is used as a lower-cost sweetener and thickening agent. The highest concentration of the chemical found in toothpaste so far was between 3 percent and 4 percent of the product's overall weight.

The FDA increased its scrutiny of toothpaste made in China because of reports of contamination in several countries, including Panama.

This is all of the proof needed to begin stepping away from trade relations with China. Thousands of pets were sickened and put down as a result of eating food contaminated with product from China a couple of months ago, and now this. They obviously have no problem in cutting corners and making profit the only concern, and their workers suffer as well. Chinese manufacturers have also been pirating DVDs, CDs, and ignoring copyright and patent laws.

They rip off the West and poison us. Will anything be done about it? Probably not.

[geoffrey]

They rip off the West and poison us. Will anything be done about it? Probably not.

Don't turn to the government. If your uncomfortable with the dangerous associated with buying Chinese goods, stop buying Chinese goods. If we all did, the Chinese would have to change.

Until you stop though, they'll keep being reckless.

[sharkman]

I've actually stopped buying chinese goods whenever I can. I have increasing concerns with Walmart, because so much of their products are made in China, so I don't shop there much anymore. But so much is made in China, it's alarming.

[GostHacked]

Lots of things come from China.

If you stop buying anything built in China, you will find yourself with not much. Yes it is bad they are doing this. I was gonna post this in my pet food taint thread, but this will do.

Both of my LCD monitors are made in China. My Logitec speakers, almost all of my pc was manufactured in China.

You'd be hard pressed not to buy something from China. Things need to change I agree. Canada and the US have certain standards for things, and well my LCD says it is Canadian Standards Certified. Should I actually take its word at face value?? But like the pet food and tooth paste, some things are hard to detect until it is too late.

How am I to trust the safety of anything I purchase ?

[GostHacked]

I've actually stopped buying chinese goods whenever I can. I have increasing concerns with Walmart, because so much of their products are made in China, so I don't shop there much anymore. But so much is made in China, it's alarming.

I have not purchased anything from Walmart in over 4 years. And now I am starting to think I should avoid Dollar Stores that have nothing BUT stuff from China. I am drinking coffee out of a dollar mug I got from one of those stores.

(eidited my spelling) Things this cheap must come with another form of price....

[Riverwind]

Don't turn to the government. If your uncomfortable with the dangerous associated with buying Chinese goods, stop buying Chinese goods. If we all did, the Chinese would have to change.

Not an option anymore. The only way to fix the problem is large tariffs on goods from any country that does not have a functioning legal system.

[sharkman]

Lots of things come from China.

If you stop buying anything built in China, you will find yourself with not much. Yes it is bad they are doing this. I was gonna post this in my pet food taint thread, but this will do.

Both of my LCD monitors are made in China. My Logitec speakers, almost all of my pc was manufactured in China.

You'd be hard pressed not to buy something from China. Things need to change I agree. Canada and the US have certain standards for things, and well my LCD says it is Canadian Standards Certified. Should I actually take its word at face value?? But like the pet food and tooth paste, some things are hard to detect until it is too late.

How am I to trust the safety of anything I purchase ?

It's true, the powers that be in the West decided that China was going to keep our economy humming by pumping out cheap products to keep our inflation low. But it seems we have given the beast its head, and where we end up is anyone's guess. One thing is for sure, it will include China as a major player.

I keep wishing North America could do some form of a European Union thing to counter China and the EU, but it seems unlikely.

[scribblet]

Well, better be careful where you get your rotors/brake stuff from. I just had to take my car in as the new brakes and rotors were not right. Turns out they were defective Chinese rotors, the shop replaced them for just the cost of the difference between them and better quality ones. Now that is da.n dangerous, next time I take my car in I'll be sure to ask where the parts are from.

[sharkman]

Hopefully we are experiencing an awakening to the dangers of trusting a somewhat backward country of ill repute which has it's eyes set on military build up. They have proven time and time again they have no compunction whatsoever about cutting corners when manufacturing various exports. They have also shown the willingness to steal technology, ignore patents and copyright laws whenever they can make a profit at it.

Their new car export, Chery I believe, will no doubt be chock full of these kinds of approaches to manufacturing and commerce.

[geoffrey]

I noticed some Chinese made toothpaste at a dollar store in Canmore. I mentioned something to the clerk who had no interest in dealing with it. Hopefully no one bought it.

Despite Riverwind saying I can't, I actually find myself actively avoiding Chinese goods as I don't want to accept the risk. I generally get my food from local organic producers, my car is European and most of my clothing doesn't seem to be made in China.

So it's not impossible. In fact, it's not that hard.

And it's great for the environment to focus on supporting local businesses... though there is no reason to legislate such a move. Just personal choice.

[scribblet]

I noticed some Chinese made toothpaste at a dollar store in Canmore. I mentioned something to the clerk who had no interest in dealing with it. Hopefully no one bought it.

Despite Riverwind saying I can't, I actually find myself actively avoiding Chinese goods as I don't want to accept the risk. I generally get my food from local organic producers, my car is European and most of my clothing doesn't seem to be made in China.

So it's not impossible. In fact, it's not that hard.

And it's great for the environment to focus on supporting local businesses... though there is no reason to legislate such a move. Just personal choice.

What should be legislated, is clearer labelling so we can really know where all items are manufactured or made. Or maybe go the other way, label it "not made, grown or manufactured in China"

[xul]

I noticed some Chinese made toothpaste at a dollar store in Canmore. I mentioned something to the clerk who had no interest in dealing with it. Hopefully no one bought it.

Several hundreds years ago, a Chinese province suffered drought. The local government official reported the event to the emperor for some government aid. Some words in the report said:"The Civilians have no corn to eat." Then the imperor read this part, he asked a minister beside him:"Without corn to eat, why did they eat meat?"

No offence. I just mean, you may imagine, if you were those Canadian who get a wage of $8/h, would you care a toothpaste according to European Standard but not according to American Standard?

In my opinion, this topic can be divided into three seperated issue. All of them seems like a one thing but they are not.

The first isssue is the the food problem. On this issue, I agree with you and others. If anyone, I believe there are a lot of this kind of people in the world, can afford to by pure Canadian or European bloodline food for everything he or she need, just do it. Ashamed, most Chinese does not believe in Chinese-made food either. Most food maker in China are farmers. No offence to any farmer in Canada, but farmers in China usually lives in poor and less developed area and most capable people have left there to city to look for good life. The fame in China usually are very small and the owner are low educated. They have not nowklege of Chemistry and the moral level of some of them usually(just some of them, not all) are as lower as their education. Most food and agricultural products manufacturers are the relatives of those corrupt local communist officals, though they are rich now, but their moral level still as low as their poor countrymen. So both of them, I mean not all but some of them have no hesitancy to use cheap but perhaps poisonous material to increase their profits. I disgust them.

To the food made in China, I suggest anyone don't buy it anyway. Of couse, some of famers in China are honest, this is why most Chinese like me has not been poison to death now, we know from whom and from where to buy the good ones. But usually western importer have no sense to discern good guys and bad guys. They usually act as the way by their MBA lecture, chosing the cheapist one, so they more vulnerable to buy poisonous materials.

The second issue is these products made by some Chinese industry, such as toothpaste. This problem is different from the first one. These problem is caused by the differece of industrial standards in different country. As a developing country, most chinese industrial standard lower than western ones. The manufacture of the "poison toothpaste" excused that their product according to European standard. I don't mean they have no fault. If they want export product to North America, they of course needs to let the products according the local standard but not to imagine that if a product can be accepted in European it may be certainly accepted in other area.

The third issue is about walmart. I have no scence about that Walmart have any relation to those problem. Both Canada and America are democracy country. This means individual have their rights to deal with their property and how to increase their benefits. The derectors and shareholders decided moving their suppliers from Canada to China to improve their frofits, this are their rights. In my impression, walmart and other international corporations did not cut down their products standard when they move some factories to China. They just cut down the cost. Some people in America and Canada lost their job. But this is another issue. Just as in Canada now, I guess a boss of a company has the rights to employ worker who asks less pay to instead of those who asks higher pay.

[Leafless]

Lots of things come from China.

How am I to trust the safety of anything I purchase ?

Ask yourself how all of this started and why.

[kimmy]

I noticed some Chinese made toothpaste at a dollar store in Canmore. I mentioned something to the clerk who had no interest in dealing with it. Hopefully no one bought it.

Despite Riverwind saying I can't, I actually find myself actively avoiding Chinese goods as I don't want to accept the risk. I generally get my food from local organic producers, my car is European and most of my clothing doesn't seem to be made in China.

So it's not impossible. In fact, it's not that hard.

And it's great for the environment to focus on supporting local businesses... though there is no reason to legislate such a move. Just personal choice.

Food labeling practices are so lax that short of going 100% local organic, there's no way of knowing whether you're eating 3rd world garbage. (are you really 100% organic, Geoffrey? Ever eat in a restaurant or fast-food? A candy-bar or a bag of chips? A canned soft drink? Orange juice that came from concentrate? Coffee? How sure are you?)

If you buy any sort of processed or reconstituted food, there's a strong likelihood that you're buying something that was made with concentrates or proteins or starches or sugars or chemical additives that came from China. And there's no requirement at all that this be noted on the label. As long as the food is processed or reconstituted in Canada, it can be labeled "Product of Canada".

The "Product of Canada" designation is a joke. And Canadian companies want to make sure it stays that way.

August1991 objects. He notes that the "Product of Canada" is administered by a bureaucrat somewhere. "Surely, the answer is not more bureaucracy, but less! We can trust corporations, because they know that killing their customers will hurt their reputation and therefore hurt future sales!"

My response is that their concern for their reputation can be calculated using a simple "expected payout" calculation:

Term A: (financial savings resulting from using cheap 3rd world ingredients) x (probability that cheap 3rd world ingredients won't hurt customers)

Term B: (financial cost of using harmful ingredients)x(probability that 3rd world ingredients may be harmful)x(probability of harm to customers being traced back to you.)

If Term A > Term B, then use 3rd world ingredients.

August cites the poisoned pet-food as an example of why corporations can be trusted to do the right thing. They used poisoned ingredients, their customers' pets died, their sales when skyrocketing into the toilet as a result. He's right, but only partly. This incident was an example of the absolute worst case for the corporations: the hazardous effects were immediate, dramatic, and the smoking gun was still on the store shelves.

Would Menu Foods have suffered any harm from this if the poison in their ingredients caused the pets to become sick over a span of months instead of hours? Unlikely. Rather than hundreds or thousands of pets who became sick shortly after eating a Menu Foods product, you'd have hundreds of thousands of pets who get sick over a wide span of time with no apparent reason to link any of them together. And the poisoned food passes through the supply chain and the inventory and is gone and there's no evidence left at all to tie Menu Foods to any of it. I'm not suggesting that companies recklessly disregard potential risks to their customers. I'm sure that they operate from a good faith belief that the ingredients they are using are safe. I am simply arguing the contention that their incentive to protect their customers' welfare is as powerful as August things.

For example: If a woman gives birth to a baby with some sort of terrible birth defect... is there an explanation? Maybe it's part of God's greater design, or maybe it was some sort of bad luck on the genetics wheel of fortune. Or, maybe one of the thousands upon thousands of products she's ingested over the prior 9 months contained some ingredient that causes birth defects.

Does the company that produced the offending product actually face any consequences?

Of course not. First, because birth defects can happen, even without some sort of poisoned product, so there's no real reason to assume she ingested a harmful substance during her pregnancy. Second, because even if they had some way of knowing that the defect was caused by some sort of poison, there's no way of linking the poison to any particular product. There's simply no way the company who produced the tainted product could actually be identified or face any consequence for using potentially unsafe ingredients. So why not do it?

Suddenly we're not relying on a corporation's economic self-interest, we're relying on their conscience.

I proposed something in the other thread, which got no responses at all: why not have a food equivalent of the "UL" designation? Underwriters Laboratories is a private company that certifies electrical products and other products where safety is crucial. As I understand it, it's strictly voluntary. There's no law anywhere that says a product has to be "UL" certified to be sold. However, everything I own that can be plugged in has a UL symbol on it, or else the CSA symbol. Why do manufacturers of electrical products voluntarily go to UL and pay UL to test and evaluate their product to make sure it's safe? Piece of mind. It allows a manufacturer to show that they've done their due diligence in making sure they're selling a safe product. It allows a distributor or retailer to feel comfortable that they're selling a safe product. And while it's something that consumers usually take for granted, the UL logo also shows that they are buying a safe product.

It makes me wonder: if the manufacturer of my toaster is that concerned about the safety of their product, and the store that sold me the toaster is that concerned about the safety of their product... why aren't the companies that make my breakfast cereal and my canned soup and my vitamin pills just as concerned?

Why doesn't the food industry have an independent company to inspect suppliers and manufacturers? I can't afford to live on fresh local organic food, but I'd be willing to pay a little extra for food that carries a designation from a credible inspection company that proves to me that the food I buy is made from reputable ingredients produced by reputable suppliers.

-k

[Riverwind]

There's no law anywhere that says a product has to be "UL" certified to be sold.

There are many laws that require specific products to be certified. I also suspect the product liability case law provides a strong incentive to sell certified products in case something goes wrong. However, that incentive works only because it is realitively easy to connect an adverse event (e.g. a fire) the a specific manufacturer. As you noted, establishing direct linkages with food products is much more difficult which is why we need government regulation to ensures the integrity of the food we eat. Edited September 2, 2007 by Riverwind

[kimmy]

Need it be government regulation?

I mean, we have government regulation right now. Theoretically, the food coming into Canada is subject to scrutiny from regulatory agencies. Theoretically, the "Product of Canada" designation has some basis in fact. If this was yielding satisfactory results, we wouldn't be having this discussion, would we?

I keep mentioning Underwriters' Laboratories because I find it an interesting idea. They're a private company whose only marketable asset is credibility. The only thing they can actually sell is the right to put a tiny trademarked logo on a product.

Apparently this tiny trademarked logo commands a lot of respect. UL has strong incentive to maintain the integrity of their certification: the credibility of that logo is the only marketable asset they have.

And credibility is what is so lacking in food inspection right now. Does government regulation have credibility? Each new item about tainted ingredients in food products undermines the credibility of government regulations. And the "Product of Canada" logo lacks credibility.

And it is becoming hard to trust food producers, even reputable brands, when we know that they cut costs by using cheap ingredients from who knows where.

It would be easier to trust them if there were an independent inspector who was willing to vouch for the ingredients they are using. I believe that public concern over the safety of food is approaching the point where having a mark of independent inspection will be a commercially viable thing to do.

At some point, consumers will want the option of buying products that have been studied by a credible independent inspector. At some point, someone will provide such an inspection service. At some point, competing restaurants and producers will fear that they're at a competitive disadvantage by not having safety-inspected products and begin to offer the same. At some point, a critical mass will be achieved and it will become the expected norm and people will expect it of their food products in the same way that they expect it of their toaster.

And at that point, if the Fung Wing Heavy Machinery And Soy Protein Manufacturing Corporation of Zhong-Bing province, China, wishes to continue selling ingredients to North American producers, then they too will need to submit to credible independent inspection.

-k

[Riverwind]

Apparently this tiny trademarked logo commands a lot of respect. UL has strong incentive to maintain the integrity of their certification: the credibility of that logo is the only marketable asset they have.

You are correct but they are only successful because the consumers demand that this logo be on the product. In many cases the government requires the logo by law. Requiring the UL or CSA logo on a product is a form of government regulation (i.e. government regulation does not have to mean more government bureaucrats).

And it is becoming hard to trust food producers, even reputable brands, when we know that they cut costs by using cheap ingredients from who knows where.

This is not going to change unless the government requires proper labelling. There are many private organic certification organizations that have been amazingly successful but there is no sign that these labels will gain the ubiquity of the UL or CSA marks. There is also some controversy because not all organic labels are equal but consumers don't really understand the difference.

And at that point, if the Fung Wing Heavy Machinery And Soy Protein Manufacturing Corporation of Zhong-Bing province, China, wishes to continue selling ingredients to North American producers, then they too will need to submit to credible independent inspection.

Why wait? The government can make that happen now by requiring independent certification of all imported food products and an end to deceptive 'country of origin' labels. Edited September 3, 2007 by Riverwind

[sharkman]

And yet another case of dangerous Chinese made goods, this time in Canada.

Health Canada has recalled the products because the coating contains high amounts of lead witch is harmful to young children.