China’s Food Safety: Challenges and Opportunities

China’s Food Safety:Challenges and Opportunities

Pei-Hwa Hopeihwaho@gmail.com

Background

• Wanted to promote a natural bacteria-based fertilizer and insecticide.

• It can increase yield, improve quality, and soften soils, and has high return on investments for fruits, veggies, and teas.

• Went deep into the farm villages for trials and develop sales and channels.

Findings

• Most farms were run by independent farm families who do not (and can not) rely on farm income to make a living.

• Most young workers went to work in cities and only return during harvesting season.

• The market is one price fits all, so farmers pursue maximum weight, not quality.

• Many illicit and fake products, main culprit.

Findings

• Lack of modern agriculture knowledge• Stick with NPK• Use growth hormone or other products to

increase yield • Most Chinese soil are in poor state• Farmers don’t consume the products they sold

to market, they grow their own food separately.

Resulting in…

• Food nutrition content way down• Things don’t taste good, don’t smell good• Soil contains huge amount of chemicals• Soil depleted of minerals and organic matters

And Pollution

• Chromium creeps up in well water• Other heavy metals in water• Pollution caused by overabundant fertilizers

spilling into creeks and rivers• Air pollution

And Safety Issues

• Residues of Pesticides and Herbicides• Overuse of growth hormones and plant

growth regulators• Leaner pork and beef with clenbuterol

(banned in the US and EU,US uses ractopamine )

Fundamental Challenges

• Lack of trust and good consumer protection mechanism

• Falsified and fake products everywhere in the agriculture supply chain

• Agriculture’s long cycle time and risks (pricing, weather, natural disasters) made is not ideal for Chinese investors

Organic?

• Organic Chemistry: Study of compound or materials that contains carbon (with exceptions like diamond, cyanide, carbon dioxide) or things that can only be produced in a living organism (with exceptions too in modern day technology)

• Organic Food: Food produced without synthetic chemicals (pesticides, fertilizers, etc.)

China’s Organic Foods

• Most are not organic (personal observation)• Price too high to be popular• Consumers just want “poison-free” food

Talking Numbers

• If water and soil are not contaminated• It won’t cost too much more to grow safe and

healthy crops with modern know-how• Not using fertilizers and pesticides won’t give

you healthy crops

Where Thing Are

• Organic retailer, lohaocity.com• Country Fair / Farmers’ Market– http://site.douban.com/163893/room/1767810/

• Subscribe (and maybe work on) your own land like littledonkeyfarm.com

• Subscribe or buy online with home delivery like noahorganic.com or oabc.cc or tonysfarm.com

Opportunities

• A foreign brand assisted quality system• Safe and poison-free products instead of

organic• Localized sales and distribution system