China Pesticide-Tainted Dumplings Poison 175 Japanese

Source from:  By Eijiro Ueno and Takashi Hirokawa Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) 02/02/2008

Chinese-made dumplings containing pesticides sickened 175 Japanese in a scandal the government says may damage relations with its neighbor, which exported $56.7 billion of food to Japan last year. "There might be a negative impact on Japan-China ties," Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura said at a press conference in Tokyo today. "If both governments cooperate and take measures, the negative impact can be minimized." China said it's ordered a police investigation. The dumplings, known as "gyoza" in Japan, are being recalled by Japan Tobacco Inc. and Maruha Corp. in the latest quality scandal involving China. Two weeks ago, China deemed a fourth-month campaign to eliminate "non-food materials" from produce a success, after contaminations including industrial dye in eggs and carcinogenic fungicides in fish. "It makes you scared to buy imported food -- you worry about your kids," said Hiroko Date, a 38-year-old mother of two, outside a Fujimart supermarket in Tsukishima, Tokyo. "I think the government's being slow on this. We've been hearing about other problems with things from China, like lead in toys." Yukio Hatoyama, the Secretary General of the opposition Democratic Party of Japan, also criticized what described as a "slow response" by the Japanese government. Some Chinese food imports may be banned under Japan's food- safety regulations, Japan's health minister Yoichi Masuzoe said today in parliament. Mending Image China is striving to mend the image of its goods after scandals involving products from poisonous pet food to lead- tainted products sold by Mattel Inc. The country picked Vice Premier Wu Yi to lead a task force on product quality last year. Kyodo News reported more than 500 food poisoning cases as of 12:56 p.m. in Tokyo. Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura earlier in the day told reporters 175 consumers had been sickened by the products. Phone calls to Tianyang Food, the Chinese company alleged to have caused the crisis, were unanswered today. China has ordered the manufacturer to immediately contact the Japanese importer to remove the product from shelves until investigations are completed, a Jan. 31 statement by the embassy in Tokyo, circulated by the Commerce Ministry, said. "The Chinese government is extremely concerned about this case and has ordered Chinese police to commence investigations," the statement said. Suspected Poisoning Concerns escalated from yesterday, when Japan's Health Ministry said eight people had suspected food poisoning from eating pork dumplings from the Tianyang factory. Today, the ministry said it had ordered all imports from the plant to be halted and its products stripped from shelves. The cases have been reported nationwide, with the most severe food poisoning involving a family of five in Ichikawa city in Chiba prefecture east of Tokyo, the Asahi newspaper reported, citing the local health office and police. "Japanese consumers, already distrustful of Chinese products, may stop buying them," said Minoru Morita, a Tokyo- based analyst and author of a book on Japan's ruling party. "The economic effect will be much more serious" than potential political repercussions, he said. The government is attempting "to get a grasp of the current situation," Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda said late yesterday. "What's most important now is information gathering and crisis management." Fukuda earlier this month said he will form a consumer- protection agency to address other health and food scandals that damaged his ruling Liberal Democratic Party's popularity. False Labeling An Osaka restaurant chain in December told regulators it had falsely labeled the origin of beef and other products. Two months earlier, a candy maker halted operations after repackaging unsold merchandise to falsify its production date. "Consumer anxiety in this case will surpass that caused by past food-labeling incidents," said Hiroko Mizuhara, secretary general of the Consumer Union of Japan, a private consumer- advocacy group in Tokyo. "If Fukuda wants to build a consumer- oriented administration, he should listen to consumers rather than quickly setting up a new agency." China's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Liu Jianchao, yesterday said it had found no evidence of toxic chemicals in the dumplings, adding production had been halted. Tarnished Reputation The nation's State Council said in a Jan. 14 statement its program to bolster China's tarnished reputation in food production had been a success. "The illegal practice of using non-food materials and recycled food to produce and process food has been basically eliminated," the statement said. Tianyang Food, located in Shijiazhuang city southwest of Beijing, is a unit of state-owned Hebei Food Import & Export Group. The company sells frozen and processed meat including wienerwurst, frankfurter sausages, jerky and freeze-dried vegetables. Japan Tobacco's food unit announced recalls of the products yesterday, while Maruha, a unit of Japan's second-largest food producer, said it was recalling beef products made by the same Chinese firm. Shares of the company fell 1.8 percent to 548,000 yen today. Ajinomoto Co,, Japan's second-largest food producer, recalled pork products made by the same Chinese company, the Tokyo-based firm said in a faxed statement. Katokichi Co., Ezaki Glico Co., and Nippon Meat Packers Inc. took similar steps, the Nikkei newspaper said. Katokichi and Ajinomoto recalled frozen food using meat products, according to the Nikkei report. Nippon Meat recalled sausage and pork products, while Ezaki Glico recalled products containing pork supplied by Katokichi, the newspaper said. Japan's food imports from China, excluding livestock, totaled 6 trillion yen ($56.7 billion) last year, according to Finance Ministry statistics. "There have been a number of cases since last year, not just dumplings," Chief Cabinet Secretary Machimura said today. "The Japanese people are on high alert." To contact the reporters on this story: Eijiro Ueno in Tokyo at e.ueno@bloomberg.net . To contact the reporter on this story: Takashi Hirokawa in Tokyo at thirokawa@bloomberg.net . Enditem