China to step up food safety measures

BEIJING, Mar 10 (Commodity Online): In an attempt to prevent any large-scale food safety crises like last year's massive dairy scandal, China has decided to step up food safety efforts across the nation.

According to China's Agriculture ministry, it will expand supervision to reach more of the country's countless small farms, a challenge in a vast country where some rural areas are still very poor.

China has been struggling for several years to overcome a series of food safety problems, including one that started two years ago when at least six children died and nearly 300,000 children fell ill after consuming tainted infant formula.

The difficulty China faces can be seen by the fact the tainted milk problem has lingered on, with new cases appearing last year because old batches of tainted products were not destroyed after the 2008 scandal.