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Old 05-31-2013, 01:42 AM   #1
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Default China’s Food Play Extends Its Reach, Already Mighty

If you dined on tilapia recently, chances are it came from China. And that artificial vanilla you just used to make cookies? It, too, may have made the same long journey to your kitchen in the United States.

A growing amount of food commonly consumed by Americans — ranging from canned tuna and mandarin oranges to fresh mushrooms and apple juice — is now being imported from China. By the end of last year, the United States imported 4.1 billion pounds of food products from China, according to the Agriculture Department.


American imports of Chinese food products gained more attention on Wednesday, when Smithfield Foods, one of the biggest and oldest pork producers in the United States, agreed to sell itself to Shuanghui International, one of China’s largest meat processors.


The $4.7 billion deal amounts to the largest takeover to date of an American company by a Chinese one. Although Smithfield emphasized that the deal was intended to deliver more pork to China, not the reverse, it nonetheless prompted concern about China’s expanding role in the American food supply and the implications that might have for food safety in the United States.


“We are importing more and more food from China at the same time we are hearing more and more about food scandals involving Chinese companies,” said Patty Lovera, assistant director of Food and Water Watch who testified in Congress at a hearing on Chinese food imports. Food safety problems, like melamine deliberately put into pet foods and baby formula as well as unsafe levels of cadmium in rice, have plagued China. The latest episode involved fox, rat and mink meat that was doctored with gelatin, pigment and nitrates and sold as mutton.


“We should definitely give the Chinese an award for creativity in adulterating foods,” said Jeff Nelken, a food safety expert. “They are a great resource for counterfeited foods, like honey products that don’t seem to have any pollen in them.”


A 2009 study by the Agriculture Department concluded that while Chinese officials were working to improve food safety and the regulation of food production — requiring the small number of food exporters there to gain certification — imports from China were still problematic. “Monitoring the wide range of products and hazards that can arise at various points in the export chain is a challenge for Chinese and U.S. officials,” the report stated.


The United States government has continued to have concerns about Chinese food exports, with a Congressional hearing this month that was billed as “The Threat of China’s Unsafe Consumables” as the latest example. “The health and safety, not only of the United States and Europe but that of people around the world, has come to be dependent on the quality of goods imported from China,” Dana Rohrabacher, a California Republican who heads the House Subcommittee on Europe, Eurasia and Emerging Threats, said in opening the hearing. “Yet the task of inspecting and testing Chinese goods is beyond the ability of governments, considering the magnitude of that challenge.”


Imported foods sold in groceries and other food stores must be labeled with their country of origin, but a substantial portion of imports end up in restaurant and food service meals, where consumers have no idea of their source.


Additionally, once imported foods are processed in any way, such labeling is no longer required under government regulations.
Thus, frozen imported peas and carrots would require a label if packaged separately, but mixed together and sold in a single package, they do not need labeling, Ms. Lovera said. Fish fillets must carry labeling, but imported fish sticks or crab patties do not.


Many of the scandals over Chinese food stuffs imported to the United States have involved products that fall under the jurisdiction of the Food and Drug Administration, which is responsible for monitoring seafoods and fruits and vegetables coming into the country.


Americans have long been eating foods imported from China, the world’s largest agricultural economy and one of the biggest exporters of agricultural products. China shipped 4.1 billion pounds of food to the United States last year, according to the Agriculture Department, including almost half of the apple juice, 80 percent of the tilapia and more than 10 percent of the frozen spinach eaten.

China is also a big source of ingredients used in food, like xylitol, a candy sweetener; artificial vanilla, soy sauce and folic acid.


China is not, however, allowed to export fresh pork or beef to the United States because it still has outbreaks of hoof and mouth disease.

The Smithfield announcement reminded many people of video footage this spring that showed thousands of pig carcasses floating down a river that supplies drinking water to Shanghai. The source of the floating pigs remains a mystery, but they were hailed as a sign that a Chinese government crackdown on people selling dead and diseased pigs for pork was working.


In 2011, Shuanghui itself got caught up in that enforcement effort, after Chinese officials found it selling pork laced with clenbuterol, a veterinary medicine banned for use in animals intended for human consumption.
Smithfield and Shuanghui on Wednesday emphasized that the deal aimed to increase the supply of high quality, safe pork to China.


James Roth, director of the Center for Food Security and Public Health at Iowa State University, said he had no concerns about food safety arising out of the deal because any pork processed in the United States would have to go through the Agriculture Department’s inspection systems. “They’re doing this to enhance exports to China because they need safe meat for their population, not to bring Chinese pork to the United States,” Professor Roth said.


Processed pork products like smoked hams, sausages and bacon could conceivably be imported from China, but only if they met standards set by the World Organization for Animal Health, which require cooking at high heats for a specific amount of time, he said.


China has been pressing for permission to export poultry, which does not contract hoof and mouth disease, to the United States for some time,
Neal Keppy, a farmer in Iowa who raises hogs from about three weeks of age until they are slaughtered, said he was confident that Smithfield under Chinese ownership would continue to produce high quality, safe pork products.


“What I think is more concerning is if China owns Smithfield, who knows if that pork will stay in this country if the food supply gets tight?” Mr. Keppy said. “In that case, a lot of pork will head for China instead of feeding U.S. mouths.”


He said he hoped regulators would keep that in mind as they reviewed the deal.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/china-...014818573.html
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Old 05-31-2013, 02:11 AM   #2
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Along with China owning huge amounts of US debt we keep sending our hard earned dollars to China by purchasing large amounts of Chinese manufactured products. Talk about cutting your own throat.
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Old 05-31-2013, 05:07 AM   #3
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I won't knowingly feed my pets food from China let alone eat it myself. What our country is allowing to happen is criminal.
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Old 05-31-2013, 04:00 PM   #4
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I agree guys. I have enjoy Tilapia over the years. We don't by the artificial Vanilla...fresh mushrooms all the way from China? That's crazy! And recently I read some articles about Japanese authorities having canceled a tender offer to buy wheat from the U.S., after unapproved genetically modified wheat was found in an Oregon field. Other major wheat importers South Korea, China and the Philippines also said they were monitoring the situation, after the find stirred concerns that the modified wheat could have made it to the marketplace, the report said. The wheat and found was an experimental type produced by Monsanto that hadn't been approved for sale. Shares of Monsanto were slightly lower in premarket trade. MON -0.18%. The future of our food is screwed.
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Old 05-31-2013, 04:30 PM   #5
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This is what the had to say in our local paper.

USDA said the unidentified farmer discovered the modified wheat when farm workers were trying to kill some wheat plants that popped up between harvests. The farmer used the herbicide glyphosate to kill the plants, but they did not die, prompting the tests at Oregon State to find out if the crops were genetically engineered to resist herbicides.

The tests confirmed that the plants were a strain developed by Monsanto to resist its Roundup Ready herbicides and were tested between 1998 and 2005. At the time Monsanto had applied to USDA for permission to develop the engineered wheat, but the company later pulled its application.

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Old 05-31-2013, 04:42 PM   #6
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Buy local! Support your farmer's markets. I've always been a label reader since I studied chemistry in college. Quite often I'll put something back on the shelf if it's from overseas. We are blessed here in south Louisiana to have fresh local seafood. When we're travelling I usually won't buy seafood or even eat it in a restaurant unless we're near or on a coast. That's why I'm bulking up while we're back home Can't get boiled crawfish as good as here in Louisiana.
Seriously our food supply is heading for major problems with the GMO's. Who knows what problems we'll have in the near future?
Tilapia from China? Like my granddaughter would say "ewww gross"!
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Old 06-01-2013, 12:41 AM   #7
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I support buying locally if it's organic. If not I don't see the point because little farmer or big farmer pesticides or GMO crops are GMO. I think it's sad this Monsonto company is bullying farmers and trying to take over our food. I read a pretty lengthy article in an organics magazine that they have seeds stored in storage vaults down under the ocean. What's that mean?
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Old 06-01-2013, 01:07 AM   #8
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People have been trying to mess with Mother Nature for a lot of years now without success, I wish they would wise up and quit.
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Old 06-01-2013, 01:11 AM   #9
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From my studies Monsanto is probably responsible for more genocide and mass murdering then the populaces of all the wars in the last few hundred years. In one month alone, tens of thousands of Indian farmers committed suicide because of Monsanto. This is a reckless company that had a goal of controlling the worlds food supply while at the same time killing off the masses with GMO foods used in most non-organic products now sold in the US and now starting to infiltrate the world. While they make billions, we die from cancer.

Here is a video I was recently viewing about the March on Monsanto around the world. Most European countries, Japan, China, Philippines, Latin America are waking up and refusing US GMO products. Yes it's not good for trade, but it's good for humanity. We need to clean this mess up and it starts with you. Don't buy GMO food and buy organic locally grown produce, fruits, dairy and meat.

Some might find this video boring but the makers are strong advocates against GMO foods and Agenda 21! You might learn something about whats going on by seeing whos waking up and why. This video is taking place in Santiago, Chile a few days ago.

[video=youtube;mBjVw3lRYGo]
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Old 06-01-2013, 08:30 PM   #10
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It's as if everyday you eat Chinese Food LOL.
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Old 06-01-2013, 10:40 PM   #11
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Doesn't surprise me one bit. Now I know why I always check to see where my fish etc come from on the labels.
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