China launches stringent regulation on melamine to ensure food safety

BEIJING - The Chinese Government has called for stringent regulation on the production and marketing of melamine to avoid its use in the food and feed industry.

According to a notice issued by the General Office of the State Council, a real-name register system should be established to trace all melamine in the market from the wholesalers to the retailers.

It further said that dairy enterprises should conduct melamine examinations on all products before distributing them in the market, and other food enterprises should conduct melamine examinations on all dairy products they bought and keep records of such products, Xinhua quoted the notice, as saying.

The notice, which was published on the central government’ s website, instructed administrative agencies to strengthen supervision on overall dairy product safety. It also urged the local governments to send officials, as resident supervisors, to all dairy enterprises to enforce the safety regulations.

A serious melamine milk scandal occurred in China in 2008 when dairy products laced with melamine, a chemical added to milk products to make their protein content appear richer, killed six babies and sickened 300,000 infants. (ANI)