Bame Piet
29 September 2008
The Ministry of Trade and Industry will this week embark on an inspection of Chinese shops in the country to see if they have contaminated Chinese milk in stock.
Responding to Monitor enquiries, ministry spokesperson, Stryker Motlaloso, said his office is still working on modalities of the inspection, which should begin this week. "The results of the investigations will be availed in due course," he said
Motlaloso stated that his ministry has not yet received any complaints from customers about contaminated milk. Most of the complaints, he said, are about the performance of non-food products (defective products), and that most of the Chinese products do not carry guarantees.
"In general, the products are not durable," he said. Attempts to get a comment from the Food Control Unit under the Ministry of Health were futile at the weekend. Last Friday, the Ministry of Health issued a directive that all Chinese products that are suspected of being contaminated should be taken off the shelves. The ministry said they have already identified some products, which are contaminated with melamine.
Last Thursday, the South African government recalled from shelves all Chinese milk products, sweets and biscuits in the wake of possible melamine contamination. The European Union (EU) authorities have also ordered that all Chinese products that contain more than 15 percent of powdered milk should be tested and to ban all products for children and young people containing any proportion of milk.
China is struggling with thousands of children who fell sick after drinking melamine-contaminated milk. Scores have died and some are said to have developed kidney stones. The milk was deliberately contaminated in pursuit of profit.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF issued a joint statement last week condemning the deliberate contamination of food.
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