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By Connor Adams Sheets | March 27 2013 4:55 PM Anger is growing against President Barack Obama the day after he signed into law a spending bill that included a provision opponents have dubbed the "Monsanto Protection Act." That bill, the HR 933 continuing resolution, was mainly aimed at averting a government shutdown and ensuring that the federal government would continue to be able to pay its bills for the next six months. But food and public safety advocates and independent farmers are furious that Obama signed it despite its inclusion of language that they consider to be a gift...

North Carolina isn't waiting for the next time imported products sicken a child or kill a cat. In a push to find problems before they harm consumers, inspectors with the N.C. Department of Agriculture have been routinely monitoring imported candy, seafood, dry spices and nearly a dozen other imported and domestically produced products on grocery shelves. The program, started in 2005, is one reason North Carolina was recently asked to join four other states in helping the U.S. Food and Drug Administration develop a better system for ensuring the safety of the nation's food supply. State and local agencies conduct...

John Michael of Bethesda stood in the supermarket aisle comparing labels on two cans of mackerel. One said "product of China"; the other, "product of Peru." For Michael, it was a no-brainer. No seafood from China for him, given the recent news of tainted Chinese imports. He wants to know where his food comes from. "Country-of-origin labeling is important to me for food safety reasons," said the 75-year-old grandfather. "My family's health is top priority." Eighty-two percent of U.S. shoppers agree with Michael, according to a survey released in March by the consumer advocacy group Food and Water Watch. And...

Foreign food importers will be able to tell certified Chinese food products from fake ones thanks to a "CIQ" mark that all legal food exports are required to carry on their packaging from next month. The mark stands for China Inspection and Quarantine, which guarantees that the exports have passed quality tests, according to a regulation unveiled by the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ). The packages should also carry information such as the enterprise's name and address, batch number and production date so that any quality problems can be traced to the source. The measure is...

Summary: China's environmental woes are mounting, and the country is fast becoming one of the leading polluters in the world. The situation continues to deteriorate because even when Beijing sets ambitious targets to protect the environment, local officials generally ignore them, preferring to concentrate on further advancing economic growth. Really improving the environment in China will require revolutionary bottom-up political and economic reforms. China's environmental problems are mounting. Water pollution and water scarcity are burdening the economy, rising levels of air pollution are endangering the health of millions of Chinese, and much of the country's land is rapidly turning into...

(JAKARTA) - Local supplier PT Hawaii Confectionery Factory has withdrawn its product "Blackcurrant" candy from the market due to public concern over the possibility it contains the recently banned chemical formaldehyde. "Blackcurrant candy is a domestic product that is manufactured under a Health Ministry license, but we have decided to withdraw it from the market in the interests of consumer safety until the agency gives us the results," the company's marketing manager, Rusmin Soetjipto, said in a media release issued Monday. Blackcurrant candy is currently being tested for formaldehyde at the Food and Drug Monitoring Agency, although the company has...

(LITTLE ROCK, ARK.) - Tests of two Chinese brands of dog treats sold at Wal-Mart stores found traces of melamine, a chemical agent that led to another massive pet food recall in March, a spokeswoman said Tuesday. Wal-Mart quietly stopped selling Chicken Jerky Strips from Import-Pingyang Pet Product Co. and Chicken Jerky from Shanghai Bestro Trading in July, after customers said the products sickened their pets. Company spokeswoman Deisha Galberth said 17 sets of tests done on the products found melamine, a contaminant that's a byproduct of several pesticides. "There were very small amounts of melamine found," Galberth told The...

Chinese Vice Premier Hui Liangyu said on Tuesday the country should do everything possible to maximize the grain harvest this year despite serious natural disasters that have affected production in some areas. A good harvest was significant for social and economic development as it would help ensure the country's grain security, a rise in farming income and adequate market supply, said Hui. He made the remarks during a tour of eastern Jiangxi province, a major grain production base which has been stricken by continuous droughts this year. Hui ordered local governments to fully implement policies that would motivate farmers to...

(BEIJING) - Local authorities may have covered up outbreaks of a disease that has killed tens of thousands of pigs in China, the nation's chief vet said yesterday, but insisted there was no cause for panic. The highly infectious blue-ear pig disease has killed 68,000 pigs across China and led to another 175,000 being slaughtered, said Jia Youling, chief veterinary officer at the Ministry of Agriculture. Some Western press reports have said the number of infected pigs is much higher than the government has made public, citing the dramatic spike in pork prices in China this year as evidence. "Although...

Deng Derong cracks his hard-boiled egg against the wooden table, peels it, and drops the contents into his steaming soup bowl. As his chopsticks stir the pungent broth, a line of customers head past his table to the counter at the back of his drab restaurant. Mr. Deng, a retired soldier who sports a white cotton trilby hat and black safari suit, bends to his morning bowl of beef noodle soup. The dish is a daily staple in Lanzhou, a city of 3.2 million stretched along the upper Yellow River,where generations of cooks have perfected its combination of hand-pulled noodles,...

(BEIJING) - Chinese state television has launched a weeklong series of programs dedicated to defending the country's reputation as a safe maker of global goods, pushing forward its campaign to woo back international trust. The first program was aired Sunday on China Central Television's economic channel and featured the head of a quality watchdog criticizing the recent furor over the quality of Chinese exports as "demonizing China's products." "Personally, I believe it is new trend in trade protectionism. Although recalls are necessary, it is unfair to decide that all products made in China are unqualified," Li Changjiang, director of the...

Consumers should not eat one brand of baby carrots sold recently at Costco stores because of contamination by shigella, which causes fever, nausea and vomiting, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency has warned. The carrots are labelled Los Angeles Salad Company Genuine Sweet Baby Carrots, and they come from Mexico. Costco has issued a voluntary recall of the carrots, which are known to have made four people sick. They were sold in British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario, Quebec and Newfoundland. The carrots are sold in 672-gram bags, carrying these codes: ITM 50325, and UPC 8 31129 00137 7. The sell-by dates are...

The organic industry has gone wild in the last decade, but you wouldn't know it at the Department of Agriculture. Despite year after year of double-digit growth, organics receive a pittance in financing and staff attention at the department, which is responsible for writing regulations about organics and making sure that they are upheld. The National Organic Program, which regulates the industry, has just nine staff members and an annual budget of $1.5 million. A Florida real estate developer named Maurice Wilder received more than that in farm subsidies in 2005, some $1,754,916, to be exact, according to a subsidy...

The Bush administration is planning to call in customs officers to help overwhelmed health inspectors protect Americans from tainted imports of food, toys and other consumer goods, senior officials said Friday, describing a new strategy for dealing with compromised products. The evolving plan, to be delivered to President Bush next month by a task force he appointed, also is expected to call for wider deployment of sophisticated technology at entry points. Inspectors would use hand-held scanners to detect the presence of lead, arsenic and other dangerous substances in a range of products. The plan would emphasize the responsibility of U.S....

(BEIJING) - China sought to shore up its battered reputation as a global exporter Friday, releasing a policy paper that touted its past food safety record. The paper also noted the current campaign to crack down on bad food-processing practices. The policy paper, issued by the information office of the Cabinet, the State Council, lists a series of achievements and planned measures, from establishing a national food recall system to increasing exchanges with quality officials in other countries. Though the 39-page document broke little ground, its release underscores the communist leadership’s drive to salvage the “Made in China” label, which...

(BANGKOK) - Thai health authorities on Friday warned consumers to be cautious in buying foods imported from China, especially fruits and vegetables that may contain dangerously high levels of chemicals. The health ministry said random checks of more than 11,000 imported Chinese products contained higher levels of pesticides, food colouring and other chemicals than is allowed under Thai law. "We have conducted lab tests and found that many Chinese foods and other products contained chemicals that exceeded our standards," said Paijit Warachit, director general of the ministry's medical science department. "All of these contaminated products would endanger consumer health," he...

Law would streamline regulations -- if it passes The apple-blackberry sauce sold widely in Seattle supermarkets, with the U.S. Department of Agriculture organic seal on the label, says it comes from Chino, Calif. It also says "Product of Canada." So how do you know where it's from? You don't. Dried banana chips are labeled as being from Sumner. But banana trees don't grow in Sumner. Peanut butter from Canada? There are no peanut farms in that country. Congress passed a law in 2002 saying that consumers were to be told where the food they buy comes from. But five years...

A grieving cat owner has filed action in federal court to force the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to “perform its duty” and investigate other toxins -- besides melamine -- as the culprit in this year’s massive pet food recall. Don Earl of Port Townsend, Washington, also wants the court to order the FDA to stop what he considers “all activities (by the agency) involving the destruction of critical pet food evidence.” Earl filed his petition for a Writ of Mandamus on August 9 in Washington’s Western District U.S. Court in Tacoma. Barron’s Law Dictionary defines this action as “an...

Rene Kimura will buy American or Japanese, but she doesn't like picking up products made in China. "If it's made in China, I think twice about it," said Kimura, who checked the labels on jars of sesame seeds for the country of origin label at Uwajimaya on Wednesday. "I don't think they follow the same standards at the U.S. -- not that we're perfect." Her sister, on the other hand, doesn't give it a second thought. The recent spate of recalls involving Chinese-made toys, toothpaste, tires and pet food hasn't stopped Janet Anthony from buying Chinese products. When Mattel first...

(CHENGDU, China) - A highly infectious swine virus is sweeping China's pig population...... The government in Beijing acknowledged that in the past year, the virus had decimated pig stocks in southern and coastal areas. But animal virus experts said that the Chinese authorities were playing down the gravity and spread of the outbreak, and had refused to cooperate with international scientists. "They haven't really explained what this virus is," said Federico Zuckermann, a professor of immunology at the College of Veterinary Medicine of the University of Illinois. "This is like SARS. They haven't sent samples to any international body. This...