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Strict health standards are required for dead pigs
under Chinese food production laws ©Peter Parks (AFP)
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China has dismissed eight officials after pork from
pigs infected with a "highly contagious virus" was found to have
entered the market, state media said Monday. The country's latest food scandal
was revealed in an investigation by state broadcaster China Central Television
which said the annual revenue of the tainted pork was more than 20 million yuan
(US$3.2 million).
AFP reports the meat had come from slaughterhouses in
the city of Gaoan in central Jiangxi province and had entered at least seven
provinces in total, said the report, which was first broadcast Saturday.
"Some of the pigs had a highly contagious
virus," added the report, which contained grisly images inside
slaughterhouses of scattered pig carcasses, many with their bellies cut.
The state-run China Radio International (CRI) said
Monday: "Eight officials... have been dismissed for negligence, over sales
of pork from pigs that were sick, or had already died."
Strict health standards are required for dead pigs
under Chinese food production laws.
A report by state news agency Xinhua said the
dismissed officials work in "animal husbandry and commerce
authorities" in Gaoan.
CRI also quoted an official from Gaoan saying 12
suspects had been detained while an "illegal slaughtering site" had
been destroyed and another sealed. It did not say whether the eight dismissed
officials were included in this figure.
The city is one of China's major pork producers with
more than two million pigs slaughtered every year, reports say. The meat is a
staple in the Chinese diet.
Poor food safety is a major concern in China, where
standards are lax and scandals involving tainted products are common.
China
was rocked by one of its biggest-ever food safety scandals in 2008 when the
industrial chemical melamine was found to have been illegally added to dairy
products, killing at least six babies and making 300,000 people ill.
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