Take home
- 8 infant formula products sold on Chinese “Haitao” websites were incompliant with Chinese standards.
- “Haitao” simply means Chinese consumers buy overseas goods online.
Since May 2016, the “Consumer Advocates”, a TV program produced by CCTV, bought 19 popular brands of foreign infant formula products (stage 1) from Chinese “Haitao” websites and CBEC platforms including Jingdong, Taobao, Tmall, Gou and Mia and sent them to the China National Food & Safety Supervision and Inspection Center for testing against key nutritional indexes including vitamins, minerals and contaminant limitations. The test result showed that 8 samples were found incompliant with Chinese standards.
The investigated brands included well-known brands such Aptamil, HiPP and Holle from Germany, Nutrilon from Holland, Mead Johnson and Abbott from USA, Cambricare from NZ, A2 and Bellamy from Australia, Meiji, Icreo, Wakodo and Morinaga from Japan , Maeil from Korea, etc. The levels of iron, manganese, iodine and selenium in products from USA, Japan and Korea do not meet the requirements of Chinese national standards.
Standards for infant formula in different countries vary. Chinese standards have been developed with Chinese babies nutritional requirements in mind and foreign infant formula not compliant with Chinese national standards is likely unsuitable for consumption by Chinese babies.
The news has aroused wide public concern and also reminded the government of the importance of regulating unofficial channels for food import as well as CBEC platforms.