Arsenic found in soybean sauce from Japan

Arsenic found in soybean sauce from Japan

Wed Nov 05 2008
China Daily, AFP

China says the soybean sauce made by Morita Foods contain five times more arsenic than Chinese standards allow.

China, Nov 5, 2008 - Batches of soybean sauce made by a Japanese firm and imported to China have been found to contain excessive amounts of arsenic, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said on Tuesday.

The Tianjin quarantine bureau said the sauce, made by Morita Foods, contained five times more arsenic than Chinese standards allow, it said. Morita Foods is the family business of the late co-founder of Sony Corporation, Akio Morita. His ancestors had been making sake, miso and soy sauce production in Aichi Prefecture since 1665.

The Chinese quarantine bureau said all of the contaminated products were destroyed before they could enter the market.

Also, the same inspection officials discovered a batch of coffee from Japan that contained excessive amounts of copper, the release said. These products, too, have been destroyed.

This is the second time in less than a week that Chinese officials have detected toxic substances in Japanese soy sauce, the administration said.

On Tuesday this week, China said it had found dangerous substances in imported Japanese soy sauce and coffee, in the latest food-safety salvo between the two countries.

Inspectors in the northern city of Tianjin discovered Japanese soy sauce contained arsenic levels five times higher than allowable limits, China's product safety watchdog said in an announcement posted on its website.

A brand of imported Japanese coffee, meanwhile, was found to contain twice the allowable limit of copper, the brief statement by the General Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection, and Quarantine said.

The two Asian giants, which do a brisk trade in food products, have swapped accusations of tainted food since the revelation in September of widespread contamination of China's milk supply with the industrial chemical melamine.

That scandal, the latest in a series to tarnish the image of Chinese goods, has been blamed for killing four children and sickening more than 50,000.

Japan last month ordered retailers to pull imported Chinese green beans off shelves after a woman fell ill from eating a product which contained 34,500 times the legal limit of pesticide. Two more people later also complained of illness.

The Chinese manufacturer, Yantai Beihai Foodstuff of eastern China's Shandong province, has denied responsibility.

Last week, Guangdong inspection and quarantine officials said they had found imported Japanese soy sauce and mustard sauce that had been tainted with toluene and ethyl acetate.

Separately, 10 people were hospitalised, including a girl who fell into a coma before recovering, after eating Chinese frozen dumplings in December and January.