If anyone remembers, last year, there was a pet food scandal in which US pet foods, made from Chinese imports that illegally contained MELAMINE, was found to have poisoned and killed pets around the world. At the time, factories in China, and the Chinese government, refused to allow USDA inspectors to visit manufacturing plants in China (to locate the source of the contamination). Now it seems that this substance has insinuated itself into the supply of the essential food chain of the most vulnerable. Once again, greed, corruption, and malfeasance gives the PRC a huge black eye. On top of that, babies are dying. It's already been suggested that this will probably be a capital punishment case. Hence, should those found guilty be given the death penalty?
As I recall... this wasn't soley the PRC's fault... the parent company of the Sanlu Group in NZ knew of the contamination, but failed to warn the PRC... The only fault that I've really been able to pin on the PRC was their late reaction time to pulling the stuff off the market... which of course, led to those 18 arrests...
Actually, you got the story backwards. The New Zealand company, who owns only a 40% minority (so it cannot be the parent Co), first went to Sanlu and attempted to get a recall started over a month a half ago; Sanlu stonewalled them. They then went to the Hebei (where Sanlu is located) local government officials in China, and was met with more stonewalling. Finally, the NZ company reported the events to NZ's government. After three days of verifying the above, the NZ government went to Beijing. The PRC Beijing government then decided to investigate: Sometimes the real facts hurts our collective ethnic pride as Chinese. However, doing the right thing in admitting there's a problem will prevent such things from recurring. The plain evidence here is, that the real heroes for blowing the whistle and raising the alarm was Fonterra, and this was through the persistent attempts of coverup by the parent Chinese company, Sanlu; even the PRC government has acknowledged this. :rolleyes2: More about this from Xinhua, which is the Chinese government's state controlled news source: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-09/18/content_10075701.htm
hmmm... interesting... time to reread my sources... *edit* My bad... I misread the timing of Fonterra's warnings for NZ's government warnings to the PRC... however, this still doesn't mean the PRC is at fault... there will be greedy and corrupt companies from all over the world... to say that this gives the PRC a black eye is kinda unsolicited isn't it?
I beg to differ. My feeling is, that this does give the PRC a black eye and I'll explain. The failure to police an industry who's actions affects the lives of literally millions of its most vulnerable citizens is definitely a government concern. This is similar to how the USDA dropped the ball vis a vis its ongoing poor handling of potential cases of BSE (Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy) aka Mad Cow Disease. Both examples highlight how lack of a government's timely intervention can literally affect the lives of thousands. With MELAMINE poisoning, the PRC may be called to task after these few thousand cases. I suspect that there is probably a whole slew of Mad Cow related illnesses (Variant Crutzfeld Jacobs Disease) that's going to hit the US at some point in the future and it ain't gonna be pretty. Governments do have the ultimate responsibility to ensure the safety of the food chain for its citizens (in addition to its other missions of economic health, national defense, et cetera). So yes, this was a failure of administration simply because local officials knew about this since a half a year ago. Instead of following up on it, they did nothing. Worse, all evidence seems to point now that they were actively engaged in avoiding recognition of the problem. That is an obvious and huge failure in governance, hence my statement of a "black eye" in the reputation of the PRC as a nation, that it cannot even manage and protect the food supply to its most precious recource (its children). On the other hand, I do recognize that once that Beijing government got wind of this, it reacted swiftly and publicly. Still, the local loose cannons officials being able to conceal this for so long from the central government calls into question just how much control Beijing has over provincial matters. If this were an event or circumstance that happened with or during the watch of the US Food and Drug Administration, would that not be considered a "black eye" on the reputation of the US gov? Of course it would. As for my feelings about the guys that did this? They should all be shot.
yeah this is very bad corruption is rife in china but corruption is in all forms of goverment around the world. If the kiwis knew about this on sep 5th and if china did nothing they should of given the information to the press discreetly. WMD.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/09/18/asia/milk.php It says, Sanlu didn't report anything to the local government till Aug. 2, and the local government didn't report it to Beijing till just about a week ago when they started to manage this problem... I'm not going to trying to make excuses for the PRC... However, it seems like it could be just an irrational decision made by the one "mayor"... For this particular part of China, this factory might have been the largest source of income for that region and the only true source of income for that city, on top of that, the olympics and paralympics were going on at the time... The mayor was probably coerced into keeping his mouth shut for the time being... once the provincial officials knew, they notified Beijing within 24hours... and of course PRC acted immediately... So in reality, it's one citiy, rather than the province or even the country as a whole, that failed to do the right thing... Granted, yes you're right, China should probably have a proper Food Safety division, but you can also see how over governing, like how the FDA essentially shoots up the prices for drugs in the US, can be problematic... debating government responsibilities is completely subjective, the best course for the country is in what the people want, and if they want a strict Food and Drug Administration, let them fight for it like they do in South Korea... China's on the right path, but people seem to believe China's become completely modern like the western world... plz... Most of China's still third world status... Give them more time to learn from their mistakes... and also I do agree, the men responsible should be shot... i have no quarrel about that...
You certainly hit the nail on the head regarding Sanlu and the local government causing the bulk of the delays that allow this to spread. Interestingly, as the investigation continues, what really has not yet dawned on many people, is that tests have revealed dairy products of several other companies too, have also been found with chemical tainting. While the focus is thus far on Sanlu, the safety of the entire dairy industry has now been put to task. As of today, no dairy product is considered safe in China. Indeed, this tragic event may have a silver lining in that it has perhaps, finally caused a focused beam of intense scrutiny to be cast on an industry that affect hundreds of millions of Chinese consumers. Most Chinese seem to hate to hear about such things, especially in English speaking forums, because many consider it to be unnecessary and unjustified "China bashing." My take? Who's being hurt? Chinese babies. We're not talking American pet food anymore. These things need to be addressed, and yes, the PRC government needs to be made politically uncomfortable because that's the only time that they ever come swiftly to attend to the needs of its people. If there was no bad press, would Beijing have acted as quickly? I'm sure there's plenty to debate with that. But one should certainly hope that bad publicity isn't a government's only motivation for helping its citizens. Ultimately, finding and punishing these people, whoever and wherever they are, with as much publicity as possible, is what's needed to assuage citizen anger. Moreover, stringent new policies of inspections and routine safety testing should be put into place to ensure that industries that either can't or won't police themselves, never be allowed to harm the public. It isn't a matter of first vs third world learning curve, or to show the west that the PRC can get better. China just needs to do this in order to restore citizen confidence in its ability at basic governance.
I agree with everything you have pointed out, I too hope China does up their stance in the safety of their people... particularly since I am a citizen of the PRC... I would further like to add however, that provisions placed on the health aspect alone will not fix this... There needs to be some sort of reform in the political aspect of this as well, although I would like to believe in the scenario I had brought fourth in my previous statement as the best possible scenario, that scenario should never have happened in the first place... If this was brought out a month ago, we'd probably be able to save a few more lives... So most certainly, something to keep the officials loyal to the country and it's people rather than a corporation needs to be enforced...
to tell you the truth i wasn't very surprise about something like this. its not the 1st something like this happen. around 2 yrs back something like this happen with eggs. they add some kind of chemical to the egg to make the yolk more red.
are you serious..... this is bullshit, if the chinese people hate being bashed so much they should have dealt with the losses and reported it when they found out instead of producing the product shipping it and then having to recall it weeks later...
You highlighted something that is rarely (if ever) talked about, but dangerously true; that many, even within the CCP, don't really adhere to the idea of owing allegiance to the nation, but to the Yuan. The system of influence and corruption, already a historic factor within Chinese society, was firmly reinforced under Mao's leadership. Just about everyone who is anyone of consequence within the CCP owes something to somebody. For this reason, only money and power ever wins out, even at the very lowest level of government. We have this same problem within the US government, but not to the degree that the PRC does. Low level government people in the US generally don't command the same type of power and authority that their counterparts in the PRC does. Just a look the simple causes of riots within the PRC will bear this out. News about riots, though harshly suppressed within the PRC, still nonetheless comes to the attention of the foreign press, and happens with greater frequency as more technology reaches parts of China that are still considered backwater. For example, take the case of a girl's rape - murder, and subsequent coverup because the accused was the son of a local official. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/29/AR2008062900805.html or the cases of a land grab by the local officials paid off by a private http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4097950.stm and here http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2008/0908/1220629614607.html If this happened in the US with the same regularity as it did in the PRC, do you think people would wonder what the hell was wrong? Of course they would. Don't get me wrong; the US has had its fair share of riots, http://archives.cnn.com/2001/LAW/03/02/beating.anniversity.king.02/ but generally, not to the degree or level that seems to occur at the drop of a hat in China. The public perception of the lack of fairness, and inability for redress was what led to the Rodney King race relations riots in the US. These same reasons seem to be at the heart of many such sparks within the PRC as well (that is, public perception of the lack of government fairness). Again, local officials within the PRC use their offices to personal advantage, and under the color of state authority, pursue personal agendas that are often strictly financially motivated. The central government's reluctance to reign in these low to mid level officials is costing China with regards to public perception and confidence; that there really isn't any rule of law in China at all. So if there really isn't any law that applies equally to everyone, then instead of following the nation, people will follow money. That is, the state can be sold out at any time if the price is right. Political thoughts in such ways border on treason, and the Chinese government, by its inability or reluctance to act, is unfortunately nurturing such ideas. :Talktohand:
yup yup, i saw this in the chinese newspaper just yesterday. saving money at the cost of lives. It's actions like this that degrades the world's view of china.
