China shuts 3 firms for safety concerns

SHANGHAI -- Chinese regulators said yesterday they had revoked the licenses of three companies that exported mislabeled drug ingredients and tainted pet food ingredients to the United States and other countries.

The action comes as Beijing has gone on the offensive, trying to show that regulators here are moving swiftly to help ease global worries about the quality and safety of Chinese exports after months of worrisome product recalls and reports about defective or tainted goods.

China closed the Taixing Glycerin Factory, which has been accused of exporting diethylene glycol, which is sometimes used to make antifreeze, and passing it off as another chemical, glycerin, that eventually ended up in cold medicine that killed at least 100 people in Panama.

It also shut down the Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development Co. and the Binzhou Futian Biology Technology Co., which are suspected of adding melamine or other chemicals to some of their products. Contaminated pet food ingredients killed or injured thousands of pets in the United States, leading to one of the largest pet food recalls in history.

The government also acknowledged yesterday that several Chinese companies had exported seafood tainted with banned antibiotics to the United States, but regulators said they had not caught the problem because the seafood suppliers were not properly registered with the government's quality inspectors.

"The Chinese government pays great attention to addressing flaws in product quality, especially the quality of food products," Li Changjiang, an official with the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection, and Quarantine said at a Beijing press conference, according to the state-controlled Xinhua News Agency.

The disclosures came amid a flurry of activity from the government this month, mostly aimed at combating growing criticism of the "Made in China" label after reports about problem pet food, tainted toothpaste, defective tires, exploding cellphone batteries, and toys coated with lead paint.

Although regulators have disputed claims that Chinese exports are particularly troubled, Beijing recently adopted a double-barreled approach to dealing with the problem: On one hand, the government is promising sweeping regulatory changes; at the same time, Beijing officials are insisting that 99 percent of the goods China exports meet quality standards and that the foreign media is exaggerating the extent of the problem.

In fact, in recent weeks, the government has promised to overhaul food and drug safety regulations and has conducted nationwide quality and safety inspections.

Last week, Beijing executed the former head of the State Food and Drug Administration, sentenced another former drug regulator to death, and even began offering foreign journalists tours of government safety labs and Chinese factories that the government says meet international standards.

And after initially criticizing the US Food and Drug Administration for banning Chinese toothpaste made with diethylene glycol, saying the chemical was safe to consume, Beijing regulators reversed course, saying recently that diethylene glycol would soon be banned from use in toothpaste.