Chinese feed destroyed, plants shut down

This follows growing fears that the Chinese animal feed industry could be
contaminated by melamine, endangering the national food supply and posing a
health threat to consumers.

Recently, eggs produced in 3 different
Chinese provinces have been found to be tainted with high levels of melamine,
which is chemical used in the manufacture of plastic and fertiliser.
Additionally, melamine-tained milk is blamed for sickening more than 50,000
children and causing at least four deaths in China.

Reports state that
regulators in the southern province of Guangdong have discovered 6 t of
melamine-tainted animal feed. An official at the Agriculture Ministry said that
the government would mete out harsh punishments to those who were deliberately
adding melamine to animal feed.

“It is illegal for any individual or any
enterprise to add melamine into feed, and we will crack down uncompromisingly on
melamine,” Wang Zhicai, director of the animal husbandry and livestock bureau at
the Agriculture Ministry. But government officials said that China’s animal feed
supply was largely safe, and that only a small number of operators had
deliberately added melamine to feed, often using it as cheap filler in order to
save money.