FDA ramps up education, oversight
Print Edition
SHANGHAI food authorities have vowed to continue subjecting 96 percent of the city's food to regular quality and safety monitoring in 2016. Their plans for this year also include making sure that the city does not experience any major food safety incidents.
Meanwhile, with the help of media campaigns, meetings, pamphlets and educational lectures, authorities say they want over 80 percent of local residents to have a "basic understanding of food safety." Among primary- and middle-school students, they hope this figure will exceed 85 percent.
The training won't end there though. Officials charged with food monitoring and staff at major food enterprises must receive at least 40 hours of relevant safety training this year, said the city's Food and Drug Administration.
The local FDA said it will enhance law enforcement and perfect the legislation of a regional regulation of the nation’s new Food Safety Law. Local lawmakers in the Shanghai People’s Congress are working with the FDA to draft a local version of the Food Safety Law, which will be stricter than the national law, officials said.
The local regulation will allow for greater supervision of small-scale vendors, online food sellers and third-party delivery websites. It will also give authorities greater power to crack down on unlicensed food businesses.
Over recent years, authorities have focused their attention on online food ordering and delivery platforms. The increased scrutiny comes as these platforms become increasingly popular with both vendors and buyers.
However, a lack of regulation and gaps in enforcement have created loopholes where unlicensed food sellers and loosely managed platforms can operate.
The Shanghai-based food delivery website ele.me was fined 120,000 yuan (US$19,354) in March by the Shanghai FDA for violating China's Food Safety Law after a number of restaurants registered on the website were found to be unlicensed in a CCTV consumer-protection program. Many of these sellers were also found to be touting false claims and operating in squalid conditions.
So far this year, the authority has checked the qualifications of over 40,000 eateries listed on online food delivery websites. As of March, over 33,000 unlicensed food businesses had been shut down by the authority.
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