[Editorial] Do Something About Dangerous Chinese Foods

Foods produced in China started taking over Korean meal tables a long time ago. Even food for ancestors placed on ceremonial tables no longer lives up to the slogan "Korean food for Korean bodies," and now it is almost entirely Chinese. The danger posed to the nation's health from unsafe food products from China is reaching serious levels. Just counting the recent examples would be difficult, with "cancer causing eel," "farm chemical ginseng," and a rice product with seven times the legally permissible amount of sulfur dioxide. The Korean meal table has completely become hostage to harmful Chinese foodstuffs.

The reason Korea is being inundated with such products is primarily because China's production and distribution systems are lax and dated, but we can't just sit back and blame the Chinese. Korea's food inspection and quarantine system and private Korean companies that will import just about anything are also very much at fault.

The best way to keep harmful Chinese foods out is to intensify the inspection process for food imports. You can't just continue to have inspectors just give imports a glance or inspect the paperwork like they do it now. Furthermore they say 10 percent of all imports are brought in by "baggage traders" who don't get properly inspected. If there aren't enough personnel and equipment then that's a problem that should quickly be fixed, you can't just complain about budget funds.

There also needs to be an improvement in the legally required description of agricultural products. Currently the place of final processing is what gets listed as the place of production, so when Chinese powdered red pepper or garlic gets used in gimchi the final product gets to be called "Korean made." It might be worth making descriptions more detailed, including both the country where the food product was ultimately processed and the places of origin of all the ingredients. The government needs to remind itself once more of how a society were you can't have faith in the food that's eaten is an unhappy society.

The Hankyoreh, 29 August 2005.

[Translations by Seoul Selection (PMS)]