轉載自：《多維新聞網》DWNEWS.COM-- 2008年9月18日(京港臺時間)
記者林桂明 編譯報導
隨著中國官員周二（16日）警告說﹐受到摻有危害健康化學品奶粉污染的食品﹐可能導致更多人染病﹐而不僅僅是已經確定的1200多名嬰兒﹐丑聞顯示﹔同時﹐已經檢測出包括著名的品牌“蒙牛”﹑“伊利”等22家奶制品公司的產品有不同程度的三聚氰胺污染問題﹐發源于石家莊的“三鹿”毒奶粉事件引發了全國乃至全球性的中國毒奶粉恐慌﹐中國和外國專家對中國商品的經常性監管制度提出了更深的質疑﹐以及改進的建議。
基督教科學箴言報17日發表記者彼得福特（Peter Ford）的題為“壞奶粉背後﹕中國商業的道德差距”（Behind bad baby milk, an ethical gap in China's business）（原文轉載於下 -Eve-）報導。
記者林桂明 編譯報導
隨著中國官員周二（16日）警告說﹐受到摻有危害健康化學品奶粉污染的食品﹐可能導致更多人染病﹐而不僅僅是已經確定的1200多名嬰兒﹐丑聞顯示﹔同時﹐已經檢測出包括著名的品牌“蒙牛”﹑“伊利”等22家奶制品公司的產品有不同程度的三聚氰胺污染問題﹐發源于石家莊的“三鹿”毒奶粉事件引發了全國乃至全球性的中國毒奶粉恐慌﹐中國和外國專家對中國商品的經常性監管制度提出了更深的質疑﹐以及改進的建議。
基督教科學箴言報17日發表記者彼得福特（Peter Ford）的題為“壞奶粉背後﹕中國商業的道德差距”（Behind bad baby milk, an ethical gap in China's business）（原文轉載於下 -Eve-）報導。
報導說﹐分析家們指出﹐這個事件顯示出中國的社會更深層的弊病。在中國﹐當國家在急于建立市場經濟體時﹐一個已超過政府監管的市場經濟被創造出來﹐在那裡﹐對私人利潤的追求﹐往往勝過對公益的關注。
“中國有著任何轉型經濟都有的問題﹐”新澤西州南橙郡（South Orange）西東大學（Seton Hall University）的全球衛生問題專家黃嚴中（Yanzhong Huang﹐音譯）說﹐“但更深刻和更根本的挑戰在于﹐中國面臨的是一種制度性的商業道德缺失。”
“你不可能完全地守衛著整個的食物鏈﹐”芝加哥大學政治學教授楊大力（Dali Yang﹐音譯）補充說﹐“很大程度上要依靠社會規范的改變。人們不得不承認﹐誠信攸關。”
去年﹐在發生了一系列的涉及寵物食品﹐牙膏﹐和海鮮的食品安全丑聞後﹐中國政府曾經承諾實行更嚴格的管制﹐特別是對出口的糧食制品。
去年12月，一個經過3年的研究的新的食品安全法提交全國人民代表大會討論﹐在8月份﹐中國食品和藥物管理局被歸屬到衛生部管理。
懷疑論者並不相信中國政府這樣的舉動有太大的作用。俄勒岡大學的中國產品的安全問題專家理查德"薩特梅爾（Richard Suttmeier）提出這樣的看法說﹕“中央政府的規定和管制的改革﹐只是解決問題的一部分。”出了這樣的問題﹐中央政府不可能漠不關心﹐置之度外而不去解決。
根據官方數字﹐中國有近50萬家食品生產和加工公司﹐“還有更多的個別生產者在政府的管轄視野之外﹐”薩特梅爾教授補充說。
他說﹐除非開始考慮建立一種多重的生產責任和代理制度﹐否則政府當局只會經歷一次又一次的失敗。
他警告說﹐必須進行范圍廣泛的改革﹐改革包括從資本市場上斷絕違規公司資金鏈﹐到建立保證使受害的消費者能夠起訴肇事公司﹐要求獲得賠償的法律制度。
薩特梅爾強調說﹕“真正需要的﹐是一種文化的轉變。”如果中國在作為從社會主義向資本主義的經濟體系過渡一部分的“制度建設上取得進展﹐那種文化上的轉變將會發生。”
袁教授還將三鹿丑聞和其他類似丑聞﹐歸咎于中國“在從微觀干預的中央計劃經濟向宏觀調控轉化時的困難”。
這種轉化“如何真正有效﹐還是一個大問號﹐”他補充說。
不過一些觀察家通過這個丑聞看到了一線希望。“一個積極的結果是﹐人們將變得更加認識到食物安全的重要性，在北京中國農業大學教授任發政（Ren Fazheng﹐音譯）說﹐“政府和社會將更多地注意這個問題...同時會有更多的檢查機構和使用更多的方法來檢測﹐這將使檢測水平提高”。
然而﹐在中國﹐輿論﹑甚至公眾的憤怒所發揮的影響還是有限的﹐一個證明就是在四川﹐地震中失去子女的憤怒的家長了要求政府官員履行問責制﹐調查為何有這麼多的學校在地震中倒塌時﹐他們的請願活動受到了限制和媒體對這個問題的報道也被禁止。
目前﹐三鹿公司被政府法令停業﹐其未來命運也成疑﹐兩名男子被控可能導致死刑的罪行﹐同時政府的調查在擴大﹐“這是作為一個對整個行業有非常強烈警示意義的事件﹐”楊教授說。
楊教授說﹕“在中國官司訴訟還沒有進入良性運作﹐而涉及公司欺騙的訴訟成本也不斷上升。廠商現在意識到﹐他們的品牌是何等寶貴。”
不過袁教授則沒有這麼樂觀﹐他警告說﹕“問題是結構性的和制度性的。如果這類問題不解決﹐我們將看到還會有很多很多這樣的情況發生﹐它真的會傷害到中國的經濟﹐特別是傷害其出口部門。”
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Behind bad baby milk, an ethical gap in China's business
Inspectors found that 13 percent of dairy firms inspected since last week had produced melamine-tainted formula, state TV reported Tuesday. Critics say state regulation alone won’t prevent more food scandals.
by Peter Ford
Beijing - As Chinese officials warned Tuesday that contaminated milk powder may have sickened more than the 1,200 babies already identified, the scandal revealed more than a recurrent regulatory problem, Chinese and foreign experts suggested.
Rather, they said, it pointed to a deeper malaise in Chinese society where private profit often trumps the public good as the country races to create a market economy that has outstripped government regulators.
"China has the problems of any transitional economy," says Yanzhong Huang, a global health expert at Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J. "But the deeper and more fundamental challenge China faces is a systematic lack of business ethics."
"You cannot fully police the whole food chain," adds Dali Yang, a politics professor at the University of Chicago. "A lot depends on changes in social norms. People have to recognize that integrity does matter."
A leading Chinese dairy company, Sanlu, admitted last week that its baby formula manufactured earlier this year was tainted by the chemical melamine. Doctors in several Chinese provinces have found more than 1,200 babies who drank the formula suffering from kidney stones and renal failure. Two babies have died as a result since May, officials say, warning that the number of cases could rise sharply.
State television reported Tuesday that 22 of 175 dairy producers inspected since last week were found to have produced melamine-tainted milk. They included major brands such as the Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group, a supplier for the Beijing Olympics.
Investigators say it appears that milk merchants, selling to Sanlu the raw milk they had bought from farmers, had added the chemical – normally used in plastics and fertilizers – to boost the milk's apparent protein content.
Two brothers who owned a milk collection center in Shijiazhuang, Sanlu's home base, were arrested Monday on charges of adulterating the milk they had sold to the company, the state news agency Xinhua reported. Two additional milk suppliers were also arrested later that day. Seventeen others have been detained, including one man suspected of illegally selling melamine.
The case is especially embarrassing to Sanlu – a majority state-owned joint venture with a New Zealand dairy cooperative – because it was allegedly such a paragon of virtue it has been exempted from government food safety inspections since December 2005.
The company's infant formula had been certified as an "inspection-exempt product" for three years by the General Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection, and Quarantine (AQSIQ), according to the administration's website.
Such certification means that "the products are exempted from quality monitoring and inspection conducted by the government," the website explains. In return, it adds, "internal inspection should be reinforced."
Forty-seven Chinese dairy companies currently enjoy such an exemption, according to AQSIQ, after demonstrating that they have "a complete quality guarantee system," among other criteria.
Not only did Sanlu fail to detect the melamine in its milk powder, the company has also so far failed to explain why it did not publicly reveal the problem until Sept. 11, although it had received complaints from worried parents as early as last March, and identified the contamination on Aug. 6.
The incident became public only after Sanlu's New Zealand partner, Fonterra, which holds three seats on the company board, informed New Zealand diplomats who told Chinese government officials in Beijing of the problem.
Fonterra has "been trying for weeks to get official recall, and the local authorities in China would not do it," New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark told her country's state TV broadcaster on Monday. "At the local level ... I think the first inclination was to try to put a towel over it."
Last year, after a wave of food safety scandals involving pet food, toothpaste, and seafood, the Chinese government pledged stricter controls, especially of food destined for export.
A new food safety law was presented last December to the National People's Congress, the parliament, after three years of study, and last month the Chinese Food and Drug Administration was put under the wing of the Health Ministry.
Skeptics are not convinced by such moves. "Central regulatory reform is only part of the problem," argues Richard Suttmeier, a University of Oregon expert on Chinese product safety. "There is nothing you can snap your fingers at and solve."
With nearly half a million food producing and processing companies, according to official figures, "there are more individual producers than the government could ever regulate," Prof. Suttmeier adds.
The authorities "will be defeated constantly" unless "they begin to think how you make multiple producers responsible agents," he says.
A wide range of reforms is needed, he warns, from capital markets that would starve misbehaving companies of funds to a legal system that would allow aggrieved consumers to sue firms for damages.
"What is really needed is a cultural shift," Suttmeier argues. "That will occur if they make progress with institution building" as part of China's transition from a socialist to a capitalist economic system.
Prof. Yuang also attributes the Sanlu scandal, and others like it, to "the difficulty of transforming institutions from the micro-interference of a centrally planned economy to macro-regulation.
"There is a big question mark over how effective this is," he adds.
Some observers see a silver lining in the scandal. "One positive result is that people will become more aware of food safety," says Ren Fazheng, a professor at China Agriculture University in Beijing. "Government and society will pay more attention to this issue ... and more inspection agencies will use more methods, so the level of inspection will improve."
Yet public opinion, even outrage, has limited impact, as evidenced by the stunted efforts by angry parents who lost children in the Sichuan earthquake in May to demand government accountability. While officials are still investigating why so many schools in the quake area collapsed, protests have been curtailed and media coverage on the issue banned.
Still, with Sanlu closed by government decree and its future in doubt, two men charged with crimes that can carry the death penalty, and a government investigation widening, "this serves as an extremely strong cautionary tale for the whole industry," says Professor Yang.
"Lawsuits have not worked well in China, but the costs are escalating" for companies that cheat, he argues. "Producers realize now how precious their brand name is."
Yuang is less sanguine. "The problem is structural and systematic" he warns. "If it is not tackled we will see many, many more cases like this, and it will really hurt the Chinese economy, especially its export sector."
Behind bad baby milk, an ethical gap in China's business
Inspectors found that 13 percent of dairy firms inspected since last week had produced melamine-tainted formula, state TV reported Tuesday. Critics say state regulation alone won’t prevent more food scandals.
by Peter Ford
Beijing - As Chinese officials warned Tuesday that contaminated milk powder may have sickened more than the 1,200 babies already identified, the scandal revealed more than a recurrent regulatory problem, Chinese and foreign experts suggested.
Rather, they said, it pointed to a deeper malaise in Chinese society where private profit often trumps the public good as the country races to create a market economy that has outstripped government regulators.
"China has the problems of any transitional economy," says Yanzhong Huang, a global health expert at Seton Hall University in South Orange, N.J. "But the deeper and more fundamental challenge China faces is a systematic lack of business ethics."
"You cannot fully police the whole food chain," adds Dali Yang, a politics professor at the University of Chicago. "A lot depends on changes in social norms. People have to recognize that integrity does matter."
A leading Chinese dairy company, Sanlu, admitted last week that its baby formula manufactured earlier this year was tainted by the chemical melamine. Doctors in several Chinese provinces have found more than 1,200 babies who drank the formula suffering from kidney stones and renal failure. Two babies have died as a result since May, officials say, warning that the number of cases could rise sharply.
State television reported Tuesday that 22 of 175 dairy producers inspected since last week were found to have produced melamine-tainted milk. They included major brands such as the Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group, a supplier for the Beijing Olympics.
Investigators say it appears that milk merchants, selling to Sanlu the raw milk they had bought from farmers, had added the chemical – normally used in plastics and fertilizers – to boost the milk's apparent protein content.
Two brothers who owned a milk collection center in Shijiazhuang, Sanlu's home base, were arrested Monday on charges of adulterating the milk they had sold to the company, the state news agency Xinhua reported. Two additional milk suppliers were also arrested later that day. Seventeen others have been detained, including one man suspected of illegally selling melamine.
The case is especially embarrassing to Sanlu – a majority state-owned joint venture with a New Zealand dairy cooperative – because it was allegedly such a paragon of virtue it has been exempted from government food safety inspections since December 2005.
The company's infant formula had been certified as an "inspection-exempt product" for three years by the General Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection, and Quarantine (AQSIQ), according to the administration's website.
Such certification means that "the products are exempted from quality monitoring and inspection conducted by the government," the website explains. In return, it adds, "internal inspection should be reinforced."
Forty-seven Chinese dairy companies currently enjoy such an exemption, according to AQSIQ, after demonstrating that they have "a complete quality guarantee system," among other criteria.
Not only did Sanlu fail to detect the melamine in its milk powder, the company has also so far failed to explain why it did not publicly reveal the problem until Sept. 11, although it had received complaints from worried parents as early as last March, and identified the contamination on Aug. 6.
The incident became public only after Sanlu's New Zealand partner, Fonterra, which holds three seats on the company board, informed New Zealand diplomats who told Chinese government officials in Beijing of the problem.
Fonterra has "been trying for weeks to get official recall, and the local authorities in China would not do it," New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark told her country's state TV broadcaster on Monday. "At the local level ... I think the first inclination was to try to put a towel over it."
Last year, after a wave of food safety scandals involving pet food, toothpaste, and seafood, the Chinese government pledged stricter controls, especially of food destined for export.
A new food safety law was presented last December to the National People's Congress, the parliament, after three years of study, and last month the Chinese Food and Drug Administration was put under the wing of the Health Ministry.
Skeptics are not convinced by such moves. "Central regulatory reform is only part of the problem," argues Richard Suttmeier, a University of Oregon expert on Chinese product safety. "There is nothing you can snap your fingers at and solve."
With nearly half a million food producing and processing companies, according to official figures, "there are more individual producers than the government could ever regulate," Prof. Suttmeier adds.
The authorities "will be defeated constantly" unless "they begin to think how you make multiple producers responsible agents," he says.
A wide range of reforms is needed, he warns, from capital markets that would starve misbehaving companies of funds to a legal system that would allow aggrieved consumers to sue firms for damages.
"What is really needed is a cultural shift," Suttmeier argues. "That will occur if they make progress with institution building" as part of China's transition from a socialist to a capitalist economic system.
Prof. Yuang also attributes the Sanlu scandal, and others like it, to "the difficulty of transforming institutions from the micro-interference of a centrally planned economy to macro-regulation.
"There is a big question mark over how effective this is," he adds.
Some observers see a silver lining in the scandal. "One positive result is that people will become more aware of food safety," says Ren Fazheng, a professor at China Agriculture University in Beijing. "Government and society will pay more attention to this issue ... and more inspection agencies will use more methods, so the level of inspection will improve."
Yet public opinion, even outrage, has limited impact, as evidenced by the stunted efforts by angry parents who lost children in the Sichuan earthquake in May to demand government accountability. While officials are still investigating why so many schools in the quake area collapsed, protests have been curtailed and media coverage on the issue banned.
Still, with Sanlu closed by government decree and its future in doubt, two men charged with crimes that can carry the death penalty, and a government investigation widening, "this serves as an extremely strong cautionary tale for the whole industry," says Professor Yang.
"Lawsuits have not worked well in China, but the costs are escalating" for companies that cheat, he argues. "Producers realize now how precious their brand name is."
Yuang is less sanguine. "The problem is structural and systematic" he warns. "If it is not tackled we will see many, many more cases like this, and it will really hurt the Chinese economy, especially its export sector."
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