Dozens of food and beverage scandals resulting in hundreds of deaths have made Chinese consumers wary, apprehensive and finally angry.
From 2007 until 2011, the use of clenbuterol, for example, flourished in factory pig farms across the country. A dangerous anabolic steroid, the chemical is also abused by athletes to build muscle mass. ...
Nitrogen-based melamine, a compound found in industrial plastics, was widely used in baby formula up until 2008, when the worst food scandal to hit China in years erupted into international news. Six infants died that year from poisoning, and an estimated 300,000 are still suffering health problems, especially kidney dysfunction. ...
White Clouds, Calm Wind's litany of alimentary anxiety also includes a fear of "talc in our tofu (bean curd)," a staple source of protein consumed throughout China.
"And we can't eat fried food either, because who can guarantee that it wasn't cooked in recycled oil taken from the streets?" ...
"As for flour, it's so unnaturally white that it's frightening," says the blogger.
Tainted food may be the least of China's health hazards -- it is still easier for the government to crack down on unscrupulous merchants than to purify China's water and air. Just this year, there have been two major chemical discharges in life-giving rivers that have sent people scurrying to the supermarket. ...
Only China's top leaders, provisioned from special farms, can be sure they are eating safely, according to Gao Zhiyong, who worked for a state-run food company and then wrote a book about it.
Do read it all. This is the government that Friedman wants us to be "for a day" to put in place better green laws. Feh.
Friedman goes to China, rubs elbows with the rich and powerful who serve him food from the special farms, I'm sure, and he thinks this is how the rest of the Chinese must live.
Under communism, there were shortages of everything except for a small amount that could be forced through the system in volume and there was poor quality.
Under state crony capitalism, China now has plenty of everything but the quality is variable and possibly dangerous to their health.
If they can make the leap to a real free enterprise system with reasonable levels of regulation they'll have quantity and quality--and a good chance that those who provide neither will be punished by the market, the state, or the courts.
