● There are not a few consumers who fall into the trap of “gold-plated food” because of curiosity or pursuit of extravagance.
Some merchants see the business opportunities behind food containing gold and silver foil powder, not only sell such products, but also use various words to package and promote such products
● The "healthy" selling point of some "gold-plated food" is not true.
Gold and silver foil powder will not be absorbed by the body, it will only be excreted as it is, and has no nutritional value to the human body
● It is difficult to supervise "gold-plated food", and the core reason is that the regulation is not clear and the technical supervision means cannot keep up.
For the industry where gold and silver foil powder is used, the policies and legal rules are not clear enough, which to a certain extent gives merchants room to use gold and silver foil powder arbitrarily.
□ Sun Tianjiao, a trainee reporter of this newspaper
□ Our reporter Zhao Li
The delicate cake is inlaid with a circle of gold foil, which complements the gold and silver ball decorations on the surface of the cake; the round and smooth chocolate is scattered with gold foil powder, shining like stars in the night sky; the small and fresh sea urchin thorns are dotted with a few pieces of gold. , makes people move the index finger... Foods with added gold and silver foil powder are called "gold-plated food", but no matter how luxurious the packaging is, it can't hide the fact that gold and silver foil powder is an illegal additive.
Recently, the State Administration for Market Regulation, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, the National Health Commission, and the General Administration of Customs jointly formulated the "Regulations on Investigating and Punishing Illegal Acts in the Production and Operation of Foods Containing Gold and Silver Foil Powder" (hereinafter referred to as the "Regulations"), which clearly stipulates that gold and silver foil powder is not Included in the "National Food Safety Standard for the Use of Food Additives" (GB2760-2014), it is not a food additive, not a food raw material, and cannot be used in food production and operation.
However, a reporter from the "Rules of Law Daily" recently investigated and found that although the search keywords on various online shopping platforms and takeaway platforms have been unable to find shops that sell gold and silver foil powder, but "edible gold foil" and "edible silver powder" are used as keywords to conduct research. After searching, I can still see that many stores are operating and selling related materials.
In addition, there are still many consumers who favor such "gold-plated food" and share pictures and videos of their "eating gold" on social platforms.
Why does "gilded food" need to be banned?
Why do you keep getting banned?
How to prevent it?
With these questions, the reporter launched an investigation and interview.
Gold and silver foil powder has no nutrition
Extravagance should be banned
Mr. Jia, a resident of Chaoyang in Beijing, still has a bottle of gold leaf wine that he bought a few years ago.
"No one drinks it. It's a pity to throw it away, so I put it under the bed and put it away. It's all dusty."
In the summer of 2018, when Mr. Jia was shopping in a tobacco and alcohol supermarket, he saw a particularly conspicuous bottle of wine on the shelf. The bottle was transparent, and the golden light swaying at the bottom of the bottle could be clearly seen.
Mr. Jia asked the owner about the wine. The owner immediately took the wine off the shelf and shook it twice. The gold leaf in the wine floated up, and the whole bottle of wine looked "sparkling" under the light.
The owner introduced that this is the gold leaf wine that he purchased through internal channels. Edible gold leaf powder is added to the mellow liquor, which not only has nutritional value, but also has a high collection value. He praised that "gold leaf powder is only eaten by ancient emperors. "Buying home means promotion and making a fortune".
After hearing this, Mr. Jia was moved, and bought two bottles of gold leaf wine at the price of 300 yuan a bottle.
Judging from the photos of the gold leaf wine displayed by Mr. Jia, the wine is printed with the words "Golden Tasting Wine" on the outer packaging, and a large number of ancient classics such as "Compendium of Materia Medica" and "Ben Cao Seeking Truth" are used in the text description to promote "food and drink". Gold" is good for health.
Later, Mr. Jia gave one of the bottles of gold leaf wine to a friend who knew wine. As a result, he was told that this wine was actually a gimmick. It was developed and sold privately by a small winery, and the cost was extremely low. , "Don't say it's good for your health, it's not necessarily food poisoning if you drink it."
According to the information provided by Mr. Jia, the reporter searched for the relevant information of the gold leaf wine on the Internet, and found that the relevant products could not be found.
However, on some forums, you can see photos of people sharing the same gold leaf wine. Judging from the content of netizens' comments, the selling price of this wine varies greatly, ranging from 120 yuan to 600 yuan.
Like Mr. Jia, there are not a few consumers who fall into the "gold-plated food" trap because of curiosity or the pursuit of extravagance.
Some merchants see the business opportunities behind food containing gold and silver foil powder, not only sell such products, but also use various words to package and promote such products.
A person in charge of a cake shop who did not want to be named told reporters that in the industry, it is almost a consensus to use gold and silver foil powder for cake or dessert decoration. Even if the ban is introduced, some colleagues quietly use gold and silver foil powder.
"Generally, the cakes using gold and silver foil powder are of certain styles, and the propaganda slogans are 'luxury style' and 'money worship' emphasizing their high-end and high-end grades. After the introduction of the ban, some colleagues will change the propaganda. Pictures and promotional copy, avoid keywords such as gold and silver foil powder, and declare to the outside world that they are 'not for sale' and 'out of stock', but if regular customers ask for orders, they can still do it."
The "healthy" selling points of some "gilded foods" are not true.
Zhu Yi, an associate professor at the School of Food Science of China Agricultural University, told reporters that gold and silver foil powder will not be absorbed by the body, but will only be excreted as it is, which has no nutritional value to the human body.
"Not only that, if it is fake and shoddy, gold foil and gold powder mixed with other unknown impurities, there may also be some unexpected food safety risks, such as ingesting heavy metals, pigments, etc. Too much gold foil may damage the intestinal mucosa. , too small nano-scale gold powder is as risky, and may also stay in the mucosa of the digestive tract and damage intestinal epithelial cells." Zhu Yi said.
In her opinion, it is necessary to ban "gold-plated food". In addition to not promoting extravagance, it is more important to prevent consumers' health.
Related products exist in disguise
Repeated prohibitions for various reasons
In fact, this "Regulation" is not the first time that relevant departments have issued relevant documents for adding gold and silver foil powder to food.
As early as January 29 this year, the State Administration for Market Regulation, the National Health and Health Commission, and the General Administration of Customs jointly issued the "Notice on Legally Investigating and Punishing Illegal Acts in the Production and Operation of Foods Containing Gold and Silver Foil Powder", requiring severe crackdowns on the production and operation of gold-containing powders. Silver foil powder food, false advertising that gold and silver foil powder is edible, and imported food containing gold and silver foil powder, etc.
Huang Qunhui, a lawyer from Beijing Yinghe Law Firm, told reporters that from January this year to the promulgation of the "Regulations", in just a few months, the competent authorities issued continuous documents, the number of joint units from three to four, and the level of documents from notices to regulations, which shows the level of attention. and determination to investigate.
However, the reporter's recent investigation found that food containing gold and silver foil powder can still be seen on some online shopping platforms and social platforms.
After searching with words such as "gold and silver foil powder food" on some online shopping platforms, the reporter found that although the pop-up commodity interface has no food such as gold foil wine and gold foil cake, a large number of titles containing "edible gold foil" can still be retrieved. Gold and silver foil powder additives such as "silver powder", among which the highest-selling one has sold more than 800 orders per month.
Although some gold and silver foil powder additive products show "inedible" in the title, the reporter clicked on the details interface of some gold and silver foil powder additives and saw that almost all merchants displayed food added gold and silver foil powder on the details page. Photo.
In the product question and answer interface, some consumers leave a message asking whether the product is edible, and the answers given by other consumers are all "yes".
After searching on a social platform with keywords such as "gold and silver food" and "gold foil", the reporter found that in the past six months, there are still a large number of sharing posts related to tasting, buying and selling food containing gold foil.
"Gold foil is added to the sea urchin, and the gold foil can't hide its golden brilliance." "Foie gras mousse, covered with raspberry sauce, with a small piece of gold foil, very delicate." look"...
Why is the trend of "gold-plated food" repeated?
Zhu Xiaojuan, deputy secretary general of the Commercial Law Research Association of China Law Society and associate professor of China University of Political Science and Law, told reporters that the repeated prohibition of adding gold and silver foil powder to food is caused by a variety of reasons, the most direct reason is that the merchants make profits demand.
The exaggerated propaganda of the merchants caters to and misleads consumers to pursue extravagant consumer psychology, and the patronage of consumers further promotes the motivation of the merchants to "research and develop", not only using gold and silver foil powder in food but also renovated use of gold and silver foil powder.
It is accompanied by the curiosity of consumers. "Many irrational consumers want to try as long as they see some novel products on the market."
In Zhu Xiaojuan's view, the supervision of this type of food is difficult, and the core reason is that the regulations are not clear and the technical supervision methods cannot keep up.
For the industry where gold and silver foil powder is used, the policies and legal rules are not clear enough, which to a certain extent gives merchants room to use gold and silver foil powder arbitrarily.
The limited ability of the regulatory authorities to actively supervise through technology, coupled with the lack of punishment and deterrence under the premise that the relevant regulations are not clear, has contributed to the luck of the merchants.
Huang Qunhui said that merchants simply add gold and silver foil powder to all kinds of food, and immediately make a facelift. The "value" of the goods has increased dozens or even hundreds of times, and the profit margin is huge.
In addition, the legal publicity related to food additives is not yet in place, and consumers still have misunderstandings about eating gold and silver foil powder food.
At the same time, from primary agricultural products to consumers, food production will go through multiple links such as production, reprocessing, and sales. Each link may involve food additives. Therefore, there are long illegal chains, hidden addition methods, and difficulty in simultaneous supervision. real situation.
Increase law popularization efforts
Strengthen coordination and co-governance of supervision
To curb the "wind of eating gold", supervision is on the way.
In March of this year, law enforcement officers from the Market Supervision Bureau of Yubei District, Chongqing City inspected the site of a catering management limited liability company and found that there were two bottles of gold and silver foil decorations stored in the cake shop’s decoration room, one of which had been opened for use.
Law enforcement officers sealed up and seized relevant gold and silver foil powder products in accordance with the law, and filed a case for investigation in accordance with prescribed procedures. After investigation, it was determined that the company used non-food raw materials to produce food and added chemicals other than food additives to food. Yubei District The market supervision bureau imposed a fine of 5,000 yuan on the company according to the law and the administrative punishment of confiscation of the materials involved in the case.
In April this year, a Nanjing Catering Culture Management Co., Ltd. was fined 100,000 yuan by the Market Supervision and Administration Bureau of Qinhuai District, Nanjing City, Jiangsu Province for producing and operating food, food additives, and food-related products that are prohibited by the state.
After investigation, from December 2021 to January 2022, the parties used gold foil as a raw material in the dessert "Pineapple Coriander Mousse".
In addition, law enforcement officers found "decorative silver foil" enabled on the kitchen counter.
The "Regulations" also emphasize that local market supervision departments, agricultural and rural authorities, customs at all levels and other relevant government departments should strengthen food safety supervision and monitoring. Those that are eaten shall be investigated and punished according to law.
Huang Qunhui suggested that to put an end to "gold-plated food", it is necessary to promote law popularization through law enforcement.
After the law enforcement department investigates and deals with the case, it publishes the facts of the violation and the punishment results in a timely manner to severely punish and warn potential violators.
At the same time, the reporting channels are unblocked, and on the basis of telephone and online reporting, the channels for consumer reporting will be further expanded. For example, a one-click reporting button will be added on the online trading platform to form a feedback mechanism for quick reporting and timely investigation.
In addition, the supervision responsibility of online trading platforms should also be strengthened.
The online trading platform must implement the main responsibility, strengthen the awareness of supervision, make full use of the technical advantages, and find out the illegal food containing "gold and silver foil powder" in time through text retrieval, picture comparison, etc., and ensure that it is removed from the shelves as soon as possible to minimize the consumer losses.
Zhu Xiaojuan believes that to eliminate "gold-plated food", all parties need to coordinate and govern.
Relevant food producers, operators and importers must consciously fulfill their social responsibilities when producing, processing, selling and importing food, and resolutely resist the production, sale and operation of food containing gold and silver foil powder.
It is not allowed to publicize and sell food containing gold and silver foil powder through information networks such as the Internet.
"Online platforms should fulfill their main responsibilities, strengthen the qualification review of operators on the platform, and prohibit online food producers and operators from promoting and selling food containing gold and silver foil powder. , should be stopped in time and reported to the local county-level market supervision department; if serious violations are found, the provision of online trading platform services should be stopped immediately." Zhu Xiaojuan said, in addition, industry associations should also formulate self-discipline management measures for illegal use of gold and silver foil powder , guided by industry association rules.
She also mentioned that relevant government departments should strengthen food safety supervision and monitoring, and found that those who violate the regulations to produce and sell food containing gold and silver foil powder and promote the edible gold and silver foil powder should be investigated and punished according to law.
The health administrative department shall, in conjunction with relevant departments, carry out food safety popularization, organize experts to interpret the safety risks of food containing gold and silver foil powder in a timely manner, and issue consumption warnings in a timely manner.
"Consumers should consume rationally, consciously resist deformed and unhealthy consumption concepts and habits, and do not allow businesses selling food containing gold and silver foil powder to take advantage." Zhu Xiaojuan said.