Majority of Chinese food products pass quality inspections

China's first white paper on China's food safety has found that Chinese food is largely safe and the majority has passed quality inspections.

In spite of the recent spate of reports of contaminated food or problematic exports, a white paper issued Friday by the Information Office of the State Council revealed that 85.1% of China’s food products, for the first half of 2007, have passed quality checks.

The white paper stressed that the proportion of Chinese food products passing quality inspections has risen continuously in recent years. In 2006, the figure was at 77.9%, and rose to 85.1% this year. The paper reported that the qualification rate of exported Chinese food has remained higher than 99% for many years and the quality of imported food was high with no serious food safety incidents, China Daily said.

The 29-page white paper is the first of its kind on China's food safety. It provides a brief introduction to food production and food quality, while explaining governmental attempts to improve China's domestic food supervision system and supervision of imported and exported food, China Daily reported.

China has established and improved food safety supervision systems and legislations, the paper said.

Vice Commerce Minister Gao Hucheng has accused the international press of playing up China's food safety problems when the numbers concerned were small, China Daily reported.