澳洲的食物安全问题

Fernando

澳洲不是乌托邦，toxic一样超标,比国内应该好点。

Consumers blind to toxic dangers at greengrocer
Kelly Burke Consumer Affairs Reporter
July 3, 2009

FRUIT and vegetables sold in NSW regularly exceed the permitted levels of chemical residue, yet consumers have no way of knowing how to identify and avoid potentially toxic produce.

The industry-run national testing body FreshTest has confirmed about 2.5 per cent of the produce it tests either exceeds the maximum residue levels set for more than 100 dangerous pesticides and herbicides, or is found to contain traces of chemicals not approved for use on the relevant crop.

But FreshTest is under no obligation to pass the results of its testing on to either the NSW Government or the consumer. And while at least two other states regularly pay FreshTest for state-based results, NSW has never bought any of the data.

Moreover, because the system is industry-run and fully funded by the Australian Chamber of Fruit and Vegetable Industries, the testing is voluntary, done only at the request of either the grower or the wholesaler.

In contrast to Queensland, Victoria and Western Australia, which all conduct independent testing for residue, no such testing has been carried out by the NSW Government in more than four years, even though the Minister for Primary Industries, Ian Macdonald, told Parliament in May that "the [NSW] Food Authority regularly undertakes testing for residues".

Mr Macdonald cited testing being done at the Sydney Markets, but the State Government-run testing conducted there ended in 2005.

The last published data for this scheme showed that in 2004-05 2.4 per cent of fruit and 5.3 per cent of vegetables tested exceeded permitted levels, which are set by the national food regulator, Food Standards Australia New Zealand.

The Government subsequently established the CleanFresh research program, focusing on just six crops: hydroponic lettuce, greenhouse cucumbers, silver beet, bok choy, strawberries and nectarines. The program ended last year, and no results have been published.

The NSW Greens said the absence of rigorous, independent testing for agricultural chemical residues meant that every household in NSW was likely to be exposed to dangerous levels of farm chemicals from a basket of fresh produce at least once a year, based on the 2.5 per cent contamination figure.

"The minister must restore the system of mandatory testing of samples of all types of fruit and vegetable," said the Greens MP Dr John Kaye. "Protecting households, and in particular young people, is more important than appeasing the big fruit and vegetable wholesalers. Consumers are being badly let down by a government that allows producers to do what they like, regardless of the consequences for consumers."

But Mr Macdonald disputed FreshTest's figures, saying the food safety risk from pesticide residues was exceptionally low and that more than 99 per cent of samples tested were "fine". He did not disclose how or where he obtained this figure.

Mr Macdonald said the Government would continue to target at-risk produce, and a program similar to the CleanFresh one would recommence in the spring.

FreshTest's national program manager, Martin Clark, said the horticulture industry tested up to 7000 products across the country each year, with about 25 per cent of produce tested having been grown in NSW.

Mr Clark said that while produce exceeding residue levels could register as much as 15 per cent over the legal limit, this was still much lower than what was deemed an unsafe limit, which was "about 100 times higher".

Fernando

NSW Food Authority  Register of offences (prosecutions)
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http://www.foodauthority.nsw.gov.au/aboutus/offences/prosecutions/

































































































































































































































































































            
            
            
            
            

不接电话

哪里没有食品问题, 都有. 只是多少而已, 只是看政府重不重视而已.