|
GINGER
Tainted Ginger's Long Trip
From China to U.S. Stores
In July, two dozen Albertson's grocery
stores in California received a shipment of fresh ginger and put it on shelves.
Several days later, state inspectors discovered that the ginger, which had been
imported from China, contained a dangerous pesticide. State health officials
warned Californians to avoid ginger grown in China.
But while the tainted ginger's country
of origin was clear, the actual supplier -- let alone the farm where it grew --
was anything but. The path of this batch of ginger, some 8,000 miles around the
world, shows how global supply chains have grown so long that some U.S.
companies can't be sure where the products they're buying are made or grown --
and without knowing the source of the product, it's difficult to solve the
problem.
Chinese ginger shows up in American
cuisine in everything from soups to cookies, and sells in many U.S. grocery
stores. Layers of middlemen obscure who actually produces goods, complicating
efforts to police the production process. In the case of the tainted pet food
that first raised concern over Chinese imports in March, neither the Chinese
government nor the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has pinpointed the original
source of the problem ingredient, contaminated wheat gluten. In that probe, FDA
officials traveled to China and worked with the Chinese government. But often,
U.S. officials trace problems with food imports only within American borders,
due partly to limited resources.
Industry analysts say many U.S.
companies save money by sourcing in China but are reluctant to spend on vetting
supply chains. "You can't just throw the [orders] over the Great Wall and
hope it comes back good," says Kent D. Kedl, general manager for Technomic
Asia, a consulting firm in Shanghai that advises U.S. and European clients. He
says companies "need people camped out" in China.
Some U.S. companies dedicate hundreds of
people to keeping track of Chinese shipments, but others dedicate little to the
effort. Christopher Ranch LLC, in Gilroy, Calif., is one of the companies that
bought the Chinese ginger and distributed it to supermarkets. Bill Christopher,
owner, says his company didn't test products it purchased because it expected
the Chinese exporter to follow U.S. rules. Since the recall, he says he is now
doing testing on imported products.
Mr. Christopher says the U.S. government
should assume more responsibility. "The government needs to do more
testing, and if they don't have enough people, then they shouldn't allow so much
food into this country," he says. "I don't think it can be the
responsibility of every supermarket and every broker."
'As Long as It's Cheap'
American companies that buy
Chinese-grown produce often demand such low prices that it isn't practical for
exporters and importers to run tests, says Clara Shih, president of Best Buy
Produce International Inc. The Vernon, Calif., company imports Chinese-grown
produce and resells it to other buyers including supermarkets. "People in
this country don't really care as long as it's cheap," says Ms. Shih.
 
Chinese ginger, which shows up in
American cuisine in everything from soups to stir fry to cookies and tea, is
cheap. Prior to the recall, Christopher Ranch was buying ginger from China for
about $7 per 30-pound box; after the recall, the company started buying
Brazilian ginger, which costs five times as much, or about $35 a box. Consumers
pay about $2 to $3 a pound for fresh ginger in U.S. stores. In 2006, China
accounted for 78% of unground dry ginger imported into the U.S., says the U.S.
Department of Agriculture.
In July, inspectors for the California
Department of Pesticide Regulation tested samples of fresh ginger at a Save Mart
Supermarkets Inc. distribution center and found potentially harmful levels of
aldicarb sulfoxide, a pesticide not approved for use on ginger by the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency. Aldicarb is registered for restricted use on
certain U.S. crops, including cotton, peanuts and soybeans. The EPA says that
applying limited levels of the pesticide to certain crops, often early in the
growing process, doesn't pose a risk to health.
China has similar restrictions. In
addition to ginger, China has banned the pesticide on certain vegetables, fruit
trees, tea leaves and Chinese herbal medicine, says the Ministry of Agriculture
in Beijing.
Aldicarb is considered a health threat
under certain conditions. Symptoms of aldicarb poisoning, including nausea,
headaches and blurred vision, can occur within an hour of exposure, according to
the California Department of Public Health. Higher levels can cause muscle
spasms and difficulty breathing; at high doses, aldicarb can be fatal.
On July 29, California officials
announced the recall after discovering the problem during an ongoing state
program to monitor pesticide use. The recall included ginger sold at Albertson's
supermarkets in northern California owned by Save Mart Supermarkets, Modesto,
Calif. The state warned consumers who had purchased the ginger to discard it and
contact their physician if they had symptoms of poisoning. It warned consumers
to avoid fresh ginger from China.
Two shoppers at stores owned by Save
Mart reported temporarily experiencing some symptoms, says a spokeswoman for the
chain. She says the company expects its suppliers to ensure their foods are
safe, and like many grocers, requires suppliers to sign forms stating products
are hazard-free. The California health department hasn't received any reports of
illnesses, spokeswoman Lea Brooks says.
The recall triggered concern across the
food industry. Pittsburgh ketchup giant H.J.
Heinz Co., which uses ginger in some soups and frozen meals, contacted
suppliers to ensure no product was contaminated, says a spokesman. Glenn
Farrell, president of Full Flavor Food Products Inc., a California firm that
makes a ginger puree used by Heinz, says he had his ginger independently tested
for all pesticides, with no problems.
Although not directly involved in the
recall, other grocery companies reacted. Trader Joe's, a Monrovia, Calif.,
grocery chain with some 280 stores in more than 20 states, decided to
indefinitely discontinue sales of all individual food products from China by
year's end, a spokeswoman says. Safeway
Inc., the nation's fourth-largest food retailer by sales, has stopped selling
Chinese-grown ginger and garlic "for the foreseeable future," a
spokeswoman says. Both say the recall was one of several reasons for their
decision.
Not long after the tainted ginger was
discovered, California authorities and the FDA began to try to trace the
ginger's source. They learned Save Mart had purchased the ginger from
Christopher Ranch, one of the nation's largest garlic growers. Christopher Ranch
bought about 19,000 pounds of ginger from another California company, Modern
Trading Inc., Mr. Christopher says.
Halting Operations
On July 30, David Margosian, an
investigator from the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, visited
Modern Trading, which was operating in a Southern California warehouse next to a
mattress-supply company. According to county records, Mr. Margosian discovered
the company lacked a public health license required by county law for companies
handling food. The county ordered Modern Trading to halt operations that day.
Rich Pirozzoli, national logistics
manager for Christopher Ranch, who had visited Modern Trading, says he wasn't
aware it had no health license. "There are so many companies down there
that sell the Chinese ginger," he says. "You kind of go from one to
the other, based on what's available." Five other distributors purchased
parts of the tainted ginger load from Modern Trading, says Ms. Brooks of the
California health department.
The FDA investigated Modern Trading, but
didn't probe the source of the ginger in China. The agency tested a sample of
ginger at Modern Trading and found no illegal pesticides, says FDA spokesman
Michael Herndon.
The FDA has occasionally conducted
inspections of food producers outside the U.S. after injuries or outbreaks, but
"it is more common and more efficient to" restrict imports at the
border, says FDA spokesman Brad Swezey. That could change under a recent
proposal by the Bush administration to better police imports. The plan includes,
among other things, putting more U.S. inspectors overseas.
According to records filed with the
California secretary of state, Modern Trading was incorporated by Liu Zhian in
May 2005.
Copies of shipping documents provided by
Mr. Christopher show Modern Trading imported the ginger from a company in China,
Juxian Modern Organic Ginger Co., in Shandong province. The documents, certified
by Chinese government officials, list an invoice date of June 18 and show that
the shipment totaled about 52,000 pounds.
In a faxed statement, a person calling
himself Liu Zhian, corporate representative of Modern Organic, which is also
known by its Chinese name Hua Teng Organic Ginger Co., said it isn't clear that
Modern Organic was the source of the tainted shipment. Modern Trading, the
California company, bought ginger from several companies in Los Angeles, as well
as from Modern Organic in Juxian, China, he said in his statement.
"Obviously, it is a fact that they found problematic ginger from China, but
no evidence shows which exact providers this ginger was from," he said.
In China, Modern Organic buys ginger
from thousands of farmers, packages it, then ships it around the world, says Liu
Zhixue, a 48-year-old manager at the company and brother of Liu Zhian.
Modern Organic is one of scores of
ginger exporters in China. A farmer may sell only a few thousand pounds of
ginger to the company, Liu Zhixue says, so a standard 40-foot-long shipping
container might be filled with produce from 50 or more farmers.
In an interview at Modern Organic's
office in Juxian, an agriculture hub where trucks loaded with apples and onions
race down roads, Mr. Liu said the Chinese government recently shuttered his
ginger-export operation. One recent day, the company's warehouse was dark, with
hundreds of boxes of ginger in limbo. Mr. Liu said he didn't understand the
fuss. "Chinese people have always eaten this ginger -- no problem."
The Chinese government has recently
restricted ginger exports from other companies in the area, U.S. distributors,
importers and Chinese farmers say. The government is now requiring shipments to
be inspected before being exported, weeding out smaller, unapproved companies,
says Jim Provost, president of I Love Produce LLC, a Pennsylvania importer of
garlic and ginger who recently was in Shandong to meet with suppliers.
The Ministry of Agriculture said, in a
written statement, "It is illegal to use aldicarb in ginger farms, and
those who violate the regulation will be seriously punished."
The General Administration of Quality
Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, China's quality-control agency, didn't
reply to written questions about Modern Organic and the ginger shipment. But in
an interview earlier this year on a range of topics, including agricultural
exports, Li Changjiang, head of the 30,000-person inspection service, welcomed
U.S. officials to do on-site checks of Chinese farms.
"If there are Chinese exported
products which don't meet the U.S. standards, then we could make
corrections," Mr. Li said at his headquarters in Beijing.
It's not clear how the Chinese ginger
became contaminated with aldicarb. "We don't have an exact answer for that
at this moment," Liu Zhian said in his statement.
The House Committee on Energy and
Commerce recently sent investigators to China to learn more about its
food-production system in the wake of tainted-product scandals. The committee
issued a report last month that said the processing industry is "largely
composed of very small, family-based operations," making it difficult for
the government "to monitor food production activities in order to ensure
product safety."
Liu Zhian said his company examines
ginger from the farmers it buys from and sometimes tests for more than 200
chemicals. "We will take samples from the ginger and send it to the
commodity inspection bureau. The tests are carried out very frequently," he
said in the statement.
Liu Weizhong, a ginger farmer in Juxian,
says he is one of Modern Organic's suppliers. From a half-acre of land, he has
been selling ginger, most recently for 18 cents a pound. Mr. Liu, 49, uses only
pesticides allowed by the government "to kill the germs," he says,
pointing to spiky, three-foot-high ginger plants. He was referring to a product
he and others in the area use to battle fungus. "We just use it on the
leaves of the ginger to protect the plants."
Mr. Liu says he doesn't use aldicarb,
which is used to kill insects, and knows of no farmers who do.
'Defying the Prohibition'
At the Juxian Agricultural Materials
Shop No. 23, which sells to local farmers, a notice from the Juxian Ministry of
Agriculture was glued to a wall, detailing five banned pesticides. Aldicarb,
though only allowed on certain crops, wasn't listed.
"We still find that in some towns
and villages, there are people defying the prohibition and selling pesticides
containing these five poisons, which seriously affect the quantity of
agricultural products in our country and threaten directly people's
health," says the March 30 notice.
Shop owner Yang Mingzhi says government
officials occasionally come to his shop to make sure he's not selling banned
products. "This year, they are coming much more often than in years
past," says Mr. Yang, 36.
A few doors down at Huayang Pesticide
Co., farmers can buy a package of pesticide containing aldicarb. Directions on
the label suggest using 3,500-4,000 grams for about a tenth of an acre to kill
red spiders. The one-kilogram package -- whose brand name, "Shen Dong
Dan," translates as "Gold Farmer Pill" -- sells for $2 and is
popular with farmers, said the shopkeeper, who declined to give his name.
The pesticide carries a warning in red
letters: "Strict prohibition against use on vegetables, melon and
fruit," as well as a warning not to use the chemical in paddy fields.
- 2007 November WALL
ST. JOURNAL
|
