Premier Li Keqiang: Zero tolerance for food safety failings

Source: english.gov.cn

Updated: 2015-06-12

China needs to innovate procedures and increase efforts to improve the supervision of food production and sales to ensure safety, Premier Li Keqiang said on June 11.

The Premier gave instructions to a national teleconference on strengthening food safety in Beijing.

The government, producers and other parties concerned should all be held responsible for safeguarding food safety, which concerns everyone’s health, the Premier said.

A zero tolerance attitude should be adopted toward anything that compromised food safety, the Premier noted and said efforts should be revved up at the grassroots level to ensure strict supervision and law enforcement.

Vice-Premier Zhang Gaoli, who is director of the State Council’s food safety commission, also contributed and stressed the need to carry out a promotion campaign on the new Food Safety Law and ensure its implementation.

The vice-premier called for a scientific and complete food safety management system, and said food producers and local governments should be held accountable for food safety. This will ensure that any food safety problems can be tackled at the start and the entire process of food production will be monitored and managed by society as a whole.

Vice-Premier Wang Yang, acting as the vice-director of the State Council’s food safety commission, attended and addressed the conference.

He said that after years of endeavor, China has made progress in terms of food safety. But as the country is still prone to frequent food safety problems, it will require continued efforts and management for some time.

He urged that food safety standards should be implemented efficiently, information be transparent and available to the public and a mechanism to trace food quality should be established.