Japan yesterday ordered retailers to pull frozen beans imported from China off the shelves after a woman fell ill eating a product that had 34,500 times the legal limit of pesticide, officials said.
Japan’s health ministry instructed retailers and importers nationwide to suspend sales of frozen green beans from a Chinese supplier.
A ministry official said the woman felt numb in her mouth on Sunday after eating a dish using the beans, which she bought at a Tokyo supermarket.
She went to hospital and was released with no apparent health problems after an overnight check, he said.
The ministry ordered sales of the beans to be halted “until the cause of the incident becomes clear,” the official said.
The Tokyo metropolitan government conducted tests on the beans on Tuesday and found they had 34,500 times the pesticide residue level permitted by the Japanese government.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura said the government had informed the Chinese embassy in Tokyo of the case.
“It is too early to determine” whether the beans were contaminated in China, Kawamura said.
The importer, Tokyo-based Nichirei Foods, said it sourced the beans from a company called Yantai Beihai Foodstuff in Shandong Province.
“We conducted an inspection on a sample of the beans before importing them but did not detect pesticides,” a Nichirei Foods spokesman said.
The beans were grown in Heilongjiang Province where there was no record of any use of pesticides, the importer said.
The woman bought the frozen beans at a branch of the Ito-Yokado supermarket chain in Tokyo’s middle-class Hachioji neighborhood.
“We checked bags of the same product but didn’t find any holes or any abnormalities,” the manager of the supermarket told reporters.
Food safety has turned into a major political issue in Japan, which imports 60 percent of its food — the highest rate of any wealthy country.
Ten people suffered pesticide poisoning in December and January and thousands of others reported feeling sick after eating frozen dumplings imported from China.
One girl went into a coma before recovering.
‘LAGGING BEHIND’: The NATO secretary-general called on democratic allies to be ‘clear-eyed’ about Beijing’s military buildup, urging them to boost military spending NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte mentioning China’s bullying of Taiwan and its ambition to reshape the global order has significance during a time when authoritarian states are continuously increasing their aggression, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. In a speech at the Carnegie Europe think tank in Brussels on Thursday, Rutte said Beijing is bullying Taiwan and would start to “nibble” at Taiwan if Russia benefits from a post-invasion peace deal with Ukraine. He called on democratic allies to boost defense investments and also urged NATO members to increase defense spending in the face of growing military threats from Russia
LEAP FORWARD: The new tanks are ‘decades more advanced than’ the army’s current fleet and would enable it to compete with China’s tanks, a source said A shipment of 38 US-made M1A2T Abrams tanks — part of a military procurement package from the US — arrived at the Port of Taipei early yesterday. The vehicles are the first batch of 108 tanks and other items that then-US president Donald Trump announced for Taiwan in 2019. The Ministry of National Defense at the time allocated NT$40.5 billion (US$1.25 billion) for the purchase. To accommodate the arrival of the tanks, the port suspended the use of all terminals and storage area machinery from 6pm last night until 7am this morning. The tanks are expected to be deployed at the army’s training
TECH CONFERENCE: Input from industry and academic experts can contribute to future policymaking across government agencies, President William Lai said Multifunctional service robots could be the next new area in which Taiwan could play a significant role, given its strengths in chip manufacturing and software design, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman and chief executive C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said yesterday. “In the past two months, our customers shared a lot of their future plans with me. Artificial intelligence [AI] and AI applications were the most talked about subjects in our conversation,” Wei said in a speech at the National Science and Technology Conference in Taipei. TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, counts Nvidia Corp, Advanced Micro Devices Inc, Apple Inc and
PEACEFUL RESOLUTION: A statement issued following a meeting between Australia and Britain reiterated support for Taiwan and opposition to change in the Taiwan Strait Canada should support the peaceful resolution of Taiwan’s destiny according to the will of Taiwanese, Canadian lawmakers said in a resolution marking the second anniversary of that nation’s Indo-Pacific strategy on Monday. The Canadian House of Commons committee on Canada-Chinese relations made the comment as part of 34 recommendations for the new edition of the strategy, adding that Ottawa should back Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations. Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, first published in October 2022, emphasized that the region’s security, trade, human rights, democracy and environmental protection would play a crucial role in shaping Canada’s future. The strategy called for Canada to deepen
RSS