(Fighting against New Coronary Pneumonia) How can food imported from New Coronavirus detected in frozen fresh packaging be safely imported?
China News Agency, Beijing, July 10th, Question: How to import food imported from New Coronavirus in frozen fresh packaging?
China News Agency reporter Li Yanan
Recently, meat processing enterprises in Europe and the United States and other places frequently have cluster epidemics, coupled with speculation that the epidemic in the new Beijing market is related to imported seafood, many Chinese consumers are worried about the safety of imported food and its cold chain transportation. Increasing. How to make imported food safe to enter the "mouth" has become the focus of the outside world.
Ecuador's frozen South American white shrimp outer packaging detected new coronavirus expert: does not mean infectious
Bi Kexin, director of the Import and Export Food Safety Bureau of the General Administration of Customs of China, revealed at the press conference of the Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism of the State Council on the 10th that in order to prevent the risk of the introduction of new pneumonia outbreaks through imported cold chain food, the national customs has launched a new crown on imported cold chain food. Virus risk monitoring. On July 3, the customs of Dalian and Xiamen tested positive for the new coronavirus nucleic acid from some frozen packaging samples of white shrimps produced in Ecuador. The frozen South American white prawn shrimp body and inner packaging samples of the new coronavirus nucleic acid test of the above enterprises were negative.
Bi Kexin said that the positive samples were analyzed by nucleic acid sequence analysis and judged by experts. The test results suggest that the container environment and the outer packaging of the products of the three companies in Ecuador are at risk of contamination by the new coronavirus. Experts judged that the result of the detection did not mean it was contagious, but it reflected that the food safety management system of relevant enterprises was not implemented in place.
How to control the source of imported cold chain food? General Administration of Customs: Import of products from 23 overseas meat companies has been suspended
"With the rapid development of overseas epidemic situations, especially in some countries where "the epidemic resumes work", the risk of contamination of the cold chain link increases." Bi Kexin pointed out that the General Administration of Customs has strengthened the source control of imported cold chain food for this purpose.
One is to require government departments of all 105 countries or regions that export cold-chain food to China to urge food exporting enterprises in China to improve the food safety production management system, take preventive measures, and ensure food safety in China. The second is to carry out remote video inspections, focusing on checking the operation of overseas food safety management systems and the implementation of regulatory responsibilities, and the implementation of the responsibility of food safety subjects of overseas enterprises. The third is to take measures to suspend the import of its products in response to the recent epidemic of aggregate infections in meat and aquatic product companies in some countries. At present, the import of products from 23 overseas meat companies including Germany’s Toneness and the United States Tyson has been suspended.
Ministry of Commerce: Strengthen the supervision of imported cold-chain foods in compliance with international standards and regulations and there is no contradiction between customs clearance
In response to the question of whether the outside world has strengthened China's recent supervision of imported cold-chain foods, whether it complies with relevant international standards and international rules, and whether it will cause unnecessary interference with trade, Li Xingqian, director of the Foreign Trade Department of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, clearly pointed out that April 7, 2020 , The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and WHO jointly issued "New Coronary Pneumonia and Food Safety: A Guide for Food Enterprises". China’s relevant practices are in compliance with guidelines and standards issued by authoritative international organizations.
In addition, the WTO Agreement on the Implementation of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS Agreement) specifically recognizes that members have the right to take necessary sanitary and phytosanitary measures to protect human life or health. Whether the new coronavirus will be retained and spread in food or food packaging through the cold chain method is currently inconclusive. Under this circumstance, on the basis of sufficient and scientific risk assessment, the Chinese side strengthens the supervision of cold-chain food and applies it to domestic enterprises and foreign enterprises equally. The relevant practices conform to the requirements of the WTO rules.
"Due to the recent continuous increase in the import scale of food and agricultural products, the arrival volume of imported cold chain food is relatively large, and there are signs of clogging in individual ports." Li Xinggan admitted frankly, "It is actively cooperating with relevant departments to strengthen the safety management of imported cold chain food. At the same time, enhance trade convenience, reduce the operating pressure of foreign trade enterprises, and reduce the impact on import trade."
National Center for Food Safety Risk Assessment: The chance of food being contaminated with new coronavirus is very small
"So far, there have been no reports of more than 10 million cases diagnosed globally and more than 80,000 cases reported in our country due to eating food." said Li Ning, deputy director and researcher of China National Food Safety Risk Assessment Center.
She also reminded that in all aspects of food production, processing and sales, if the surrounding environment is contaminated by the new crown virus, or the food practitioners are infected with the new crown virus, it may cause pollution to the food. Food practitioners must strictly follow the relevant regulations and requirements, and do a good job in the sanitation and disinfection of food production, processing, sales and sales environment and facilities.
According to her, monitoring of new coronavirus in food and other samples has recently been strengthened across China. As of July 7, nearly 60,000 food samples including Zhejiang, Yunnan, Henan, Shandong, and Ningxia reported negative results for the nucleic acid test of the new coronavirus. "In general, the chance of food being contaminated with new coronavirus is very small." (End)