Philippines starts testing Chinese milk products
By Tarra Quismundo, Thea Alberto
Agence France-Presse, Reuters, INQUIRER.net, Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 18:38:00 09/22/2008
Filed Under: Consumer Issues, Food, Children, Diseases, Health
MANILA, Philippines -- (UPDATE) The Philippines is testing dairy imports from China and will slap a ban on these if found contaminated with an industrial chemical that had sickened nearly 53,000 Chinese children.
"We will have to recall all these products if there is evidence they contain melamine," Health Secretary Francisco Duque said Monday.
Melamine, normally used in making plastics, was first found in infant milk formula in Chinese markets but has since been detected in a range of products with dairy ingredients both in China and abroad.
Manila's Bureau of Food and Drugs has confirmed that 15 China-made milk products were being sold in the Philippines.
BFAD is currently doing random testing of "made in China" milk products across the country, and its regional offices have started collecting samples of two Chinese liquid milk products confirmed to be in the Philippine market, BFAD Director Leticia Gutierrez said Monday.
“There are two liquid milk products, Yili and Mengniu, that we've confirmed to be distributed here. We've instructed our regional inspectors to collect samples so we can test them in our laboratory for the presence of melamine,” Gutierrez told the Philippine Daily Inquirer (parent company of INQUIRER.net) when reached by phone Monday.
Yili dairy, maker of a milk product that downed a three-year-old girl from Hong Kong, is among 22 Chinese producers whose baby formula was found to contain melamine. Their products were recently recalled on orders of the Chinese Health Ministry.
Gutierrez said 13 other Chinese milk brands would later be tested for melamine traces as she gave assurances that BFAD has laboratory equipment capable of detecting the dangerous substance in milk products.
Asked whether BFAD has determined the scope of distribution of Chinese milk brands in the country, Gutierrez said: “Chances are, we can determine the distribution through the importers. We can ask the help of importers to determine that.”
Powder and liquid milk tainted with melamine, a nitrogen-rich chemical used in the production of plastic products, have downed close to 53,000 children in China and its territory Hong Kong over the past few weeks.
Said to damage kidneys, the substance could be more dangerous in cases of child ingestion.
After the testing, the bureau will come up with a list of milk products that are deemed unsafe, hopefully within the week, Gutierrez said.
"We'll be sharing the results [of the tests] with the public as soon as we have collected enough data," she said.
BFAD has confirmed that China's Sanlu Group, blamed for most of the poisoning cases, does not export its goods to the Philippines.
"As far as the Sanlu milk products are concerned, we do not have an importer licensed to import them. They're not supposed to be in the market," Gutierrez told Reuters.
Sanlu said two weeks ago, it was reported that babies developed kidney stones and other complications after drinking the tainted milk. But the company failed to publicly disclose the problem throughout August when Beijing hosted the Olympic Games, officials said.
Food giant Nestle Philippines gave assurances its products are safe, following reports the Hong Kong’s food safety body had found melamine in a Nestle Dairy Farm pure milk sample from northeastern China.
"Nestle Philippines Incorporated assures consumers that its milk products are safe for consumption," Sandra Puno, Nestle Philippines director of communication, said in a statement Monday.
She said Nestle Philippines imports its dairy not from China but from Australia, New Zealand, Europe, and the United States.
"Nestle milk products are manufactured under high quality control standards and meet all regulatory standards before they are released to the local market," she said.
Nestle Philippines is the manufacturer of Nido, Bear Brand, Neslac, Nestogen, and Nesvita.
Trade Undersecretary Zenaida Maglaya warned consumers against buying milk products without labels amid reports that there might be Chinese milk products smuggled into the country that were finding their way into small bakeshops.
A host of countries -- Bangladesh, Brunei, Burundi, Japan, Gabon, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore and Tanzania -- have barred Chinese milk products or taken some other form of action to curb consumption.
The scandal stems from the practice of adding melamine to watered-down milk to give it the appearance of higher protein levels.
It first came to light two weeks ago in state-controlled media, but some press reports say the scam had been going on for years.
Shigeru Omi, Western Pacific director of the UN World Health Organization, raised concerns the health risks were not reported earlier by China.
He told a press conference in Manila that "it seems people already knew of this problem for some time and did not share this information."
New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra, which has a joint venture with the Sanlu Group, the first company identified in the scandal, said it knew for weeks and had been pushing for a recall.
China has been hit by a wave of embarrassing scandals in recent years over dangerous products including food, drugs and toys, spoiling its manufacturing reputation.
Last year, melamine was found in pet food containing Chinese ingredients that killed cats and dogs in the United States.
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