Aug 2, 2007 12:07 pm US/Eastern
China Insists Its Imports Are Safe
Remark Comes Amid Fisher-Price, Toothpaste Recall
BEIJING (AP) ―
China insisted Thursday that 99 percent of its exports were safe amid a huge U.S. recall of almost a million Chinese-made toys decorated with lead-contaminated paint.
The remarks came just ahead of toymaker Fisher-Price's announcement that it was recalling 83 types of toys, including the popular Big Bird, Elmo, Dora and Diego characters; the latest in an expanding list of Chinese exports penalized for containing potentially dangerous substances.
"China has always conducted international trade in the spirit of being responsible to its trade partners and itself," Commerce Minister Bo Xilai said in a statement published Thursday on the ministry's Web site. "Ninety-nine percent of China's exports are good and safe."
Bo, whose remarks were made Wednesday to his Mexican counterpart, said he hoped China's trade partners would adopt an attitude of "objectivity, fairness and reason" toward its products.
Fears were triggered earlier this year after a Chinese-made ingredient in pet food was linked to the deaths of cat and dogs in North America. Since then Chinese goods ranging from toothpaste to seafood have been banned or recalled in numerous countries.
Fisher-Price said the problem with the recalled toys was detected by an internal probe and reported to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, which works with companies to issue recalls when it finds consumer goods that can be harmful.
The toymaker and the commission issued statements saying parents should keep suspect toys away from children and contact the company.
David Allmark, general manager of Fisher-Price, said the recall was "fast-tracked," which allowed the company to quarantine two-thirds of the toys before they even made it to store shelves.
"There will be a dramatic investigation on how this happened," he said.
Under current U.S. regulations, children's products found to have more than .06 percent of lead are subject to a recall.
"We were asked to take some Fisher-Price toys off of our shelves several days ago. It seemed like they wanted to recall those toys," said a saleswomen with a toy store in downtown Beijing's popular Wangfujing shopping street. She wouldn't give any other details and only give her surname, Wang.
An official surnamed Xia who answered the telephone Thursday at China's General Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, one of the country's main quality watchdogs, said the agency had heard of the recall but could not comment because the case was under investigation. She said she did not know what China's regulations on lead levels were.
Wei Chuanzhong, an AQSIQ official, said China wants to "cooperate with other countries including the U.S. to strengthen cooperation and communication."
However, Wei added while China would "not avoid our problems, we also do not agree to playing up the situation regardless of the facts.
"We shouldn't use problems found in one product to block all products," Wei told a team of visiting U.S. health officials on Wednesday.
His stance was a nod to Chinese concerns that scattered safety violations are threatening the reputation of Chinese exports as a whole. China has acknowledged safety problems, but says other countries are grappling with similar issues and insists its products should not be unfairly singled out.
Wei met with the American delegation, which was led by U.S. Health and Human Services official Rich McKeown. The delegation's five-day visit is centered around developing systems for ensuring the safety of food, feed, drugs and medical devices exported from China.
Talks have also touched on U.S. restrictions against Chinese catfish, basa, dace, shrimp and eel imposed after repeated testing turned up contamination by drugs that have not been approved in the United States for farmed seafood.
Also Thursday, state media said Chinese quarantine officials have seized two tons of dried banana chips imported from the Philippines because they contained levels of the preservative sulfur dioxide that were 25 times the maximum allowed by Chinese regulations. The 100 boxes of chips will either be returned to the Philippines or destroyed, the official Xinhua News Agency said.
China's latest moves; both conciliatory and defensive; illustrate how the country has been dealing with a growing international backlash against its exports because of health and safety concerns.
Xinhua also said two people have been arrested in the southwestern province of Sichuan for selling fake rabies vaccines.
Like China's food industry, the pharmaceutical field is poorly regulated, with companies trying to cash in by substituting fake or substandard ingredients.
The rabies vaccines, made in Heilongjiang province hundreds of miles north of Sichuan, had been administered to 29 people in Sichuan and another 198 in Heilongjiang, Xinhua said.
No side effects have been reported but the people are under close observation, the agency reported.
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