Scanning fake food
Recently, a series of fake food cases have been exposed, showing loopholes in management.
Starting with a fake milk production line at Rance Pharma Company and Hacofood Group (Hanoi), collecting more than 26,000 boxes of milk. Since 2021, this group has established a company to produce 573 fake milk brands, targeting patients, premature babies, and pregnant women. Test results determined that 12 products had nutritional content below 70% announced.
Next, the authorities seized nearly 10 tons of drugs and ingredients. Since 2021, this group has established factories and produced fake drugs distributed through pharmacies and social networks, earning nearly 200 billion VND. Some fake Eastern medicine contains large amounts of painkillers.
The Ministry of Public Security continues to investigate the fake health protection food production ring of Herbitech Company. BABY SHARK and Medi Kid Calcium K2 products were determined to be counterfeit.
A case of producing and trading more than 100 tons of fake functional foods since 2016 was also exposed by the authorities. The subjects established many companies, produced more than 900 fake health protection food brands, mainly targeting the elderly and children, one company's revenue reached 800 billion VND.
Post-inspection loophole
On the side of the Ministry of Health, Dr. Tran Viet Nga - Director of the Department of Food Safety - said that Decree 15/2018/ND-CP stipulates that most of the foods are self-declared by businesses, only 4 groups of products must register to be announced before circulation: health protection foods, nutritional foods for special diets, foods with increased micronutrients and new products for uses and ingredients. The provincial People's Committee receives documents, issues advertising certificates, and advertising confirmation certificates; only health protection foods are received by the Food Safety Department. If there are violations, the locality is responsible for handling them.
Pharmaceutical Dr. Nguyen Xuan Hoang - Vice President of the Functional Food Association - said: in addition to the circular on safety indicators such as toxins, banned substances, microorganisms, heavy metals, it is necessary to issue an additional circular regulating product quality standards. Currently, there are no mandatory regulations for announcing the quantity of functional foods, and testing for herbs is mainly determination, and the content has not been determined. Therefore, product advertising and advertising needs to be standardized to avoid errors or fraud in production.
"It is necessary for businesses to announce quality standards along with testing methods to distinguish between real and fake units. Even if it is self-declared, businesses must submit a testing method for periodic inspection and detection of violations," Mr. Hoang emphasized.
Tightening food safety management
The draft Decree replaces Decree 15/2018/ND-CP, aiming to strengthen food safety control, proposing that the agency receiving the self-declaration of products will be responsible for giving opinions, posting information, developing a post-inspection plan and taking samples to monitor product quality circulating on the market. This regulation overcomes the situation of enterprises self-classifying, self-declaration incorrectly and exaggerating publications.
The group of additional foods will be required to register the product declaration. Health protection products, medical nutrition, special diet foods and nutrition for children under 36 months old must also have a published dossier from the research and development stage to before circulation.
Enterprises must announce quality indicators, instead of only announcing safety indicators as before. If there is a violation, the authorities will revoke the certificate, advertising confirmation certificate, product declaration file and temporarily suspend receiving new file until the repair is completed.
To improve production conditions, the production facilities of the above product groups must have a food safety management system certificate such as GMP, HACCP, ISO 22000 or equivalent. The Ministry of Science and Technology will supervise organizations that are licensed.
Post-inspection activities are specifically regulated on plans, frequency, inspection content, increasing the role of testing facilities and connecting data on the National Public Service Portal to monitor and recall products in a timely manner.
Regarding advertising, the draft requires increased supervision on e-commerce platforms and social networks, promulgation of a code of professional conduct, and publicization of the relationship between advertisers and sponsors.
Relevant ministries and provincial People's Committees will be assigned the responsibility of managing, controlling prices, combating trade fraud and handling violations. The draft also adds regulations on domestic consumption conversion, changing product use purposes and tightening inspection of imported foods.
