Press Release
July 18, 2007

Intensify food inspection - Villar

SENATE President Manny Villar urged the Bureau of Food and Drugs (BFAD) to intensify its efforts at inspecting the safety of food products as he commended the agency for reporting the formalin content of a number of imported products yesterday.

The BFAD, after inspecting for more than two weeks over 600 food products that the Philippines imported from China, found that the White Rabbit creamy candy and three other food products from China were found to contain the poisonous chemical substance formaldehyde, commercially known as formalin.

Based on the findings of the US Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration, formaldehyde is linked to fatal diseases such as brain and lung cancer and leukemia. It is used in embalming and making glue, plastic and disinfectant.

Stressing formalin's health hazard, Villar said products laced with the chemical must be immediately withdrawn from the market, and accompanying liabilities answered for. "The strictest safeguards especially on food products must be consistently in place as the health of our citizens is at stake," he said.

The other three products found to be tainted with formalin are a brand of milk candy made by Romanticfish Food Industry, Bairong Grape Biscuits made by Dongguan Bairong Food Stuff Company and distributed by Goodway Int'l. Trading Corp. and Yong Kang Foods Grape Biscuits made by Dongguan Yongkang Food Company, Ltd.

BFAD Deputy Director Joshua Ramos yesterday said that the agency's report on the findings, signed by Director Barbara Gutierrez and submitted to Health Secretary Francisco Duque, will be used as basis to ban these products made in China.

The other kind of White Rabbit candy the brown and hard one already manufactured in the Philippines, does not contain formaldehyde, according to BFAD.

The White rabbit with a chewy and soft texture, wrapped in edible paper made of sticky rice is one of China's top candy brands, manufactured in Shanghai by Guanshengyuan Food, Ltd.

Villar, whose five-point legislative agenda includes health, also filed a bill recently urging BFAD and the Health department to guarantee the safety of bottled water products.

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