The recall of more than 8,200 tons (previously reported to be 700 tons) of Sanlu-brand "problem infant formula" is a problem bigger than just one brand and one company.
Up to now, it looks still contestable at which stage of the entire business process the poison, a chemical called melamine, got the access to contaminate what used to be the No 1 selling infant milk formula in this country.
The complexity of the problem betrays the complexity in policing for food security in an industrial environment. There are many potential loopholes, therefore many sources are to be mobilized to police them - not just one or two government agencies, and not just one or two companies.
If, as suggested by the latest reports, the chemical had already been mixed, with or without intention, in the milk before the company collected it from dairy farmers, and if, judging from the magnitude of the crisis, adding it to milk was a practice by not a small number of the farmers, then it can't be that just Sanlu's formula has problems. The country's milk industry may be affected.
Moreover, if Sanlu's first consumer complaint about baby's urine disorder was lodged as early as in March, and its first report of infant kidney stone case filed as early as in June, how could it be allowed to continue selling the poisonous baby milk formula for so long? It may suggest that the entire country's quality inspection service needs an overhaul.
The company was ordered to close down by the Hebei provincial government, with all its assets "frozen," pending restructuring of the company and perhaps criminal investigation. Already last week, 78 persons were interrogated by the police, with 19 detained for their suspected responsibility for the food alarm.
These are good moves. But if it is always up to the government to try single-handedly to identify and to stop all the law-breaking and standards-evading practices in the marketplace, the public will not get much better protection than what is given to them at the moment.
In food hygiene, there are several national agencies, with several major laws, hundreds of regulations, and perhaps tomes of national standards.
But on a day-to-day basis, just revising the laws and standards can keep them busy enough.
If this is the only system to depend on, then whatever good laws and standards there are, their reinforcement in China may always be inadequate and clumsy.
Cases have been many, especially since 2003 during the outbreak of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome), where the government alone was not enough to either expose or contain a public crisis.
Regulators cannot be effective when they try to solve all problems by themselves. There should be a third-party institution, joined by independent professionals, consumer associations and industry associations, to be constantly on guard, with direct contacts with the national press to give timely alarms to the government and society.
In cases that concern the health of mothers and babies, the women's association should be given a more active part to play.
China's weak dairy industry association already suggested in Harbin, Heilongjiang province, that there should at least be a third-party quality inspection organization for the animal feeds to protect the quality of the milk materials. For at times, chemical melamine is also used to mix with the feeds, as the Chinese-language press exposed.
So much economic development has been achieved in China that the government is no longer suitable to act as the only source of help for the increasingly diverse interests of its populace.
So industry NGOs and consumer rights campaigns are not just good for healthy lives and a healthy market. They also help the government to avoid losing credibility by reacting seemingly reluctantly and slowly as if to protect the shady business executives when it actually has nothing to gain by doing so.
E-mail: younuo@chinadaily.com.cn
