Oct 29, 2014
Eleven countries and regions, mainly in Asia, have barred certain food products from Taiwan due to the current edible oil scandal, affecting NT$2.2 billion (US$72.4 million) worth of exports, economics minister Woody Duh said Monday.
The markets are China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, the Philippines, Chile, the Netherlands, Vietnam and New Zealand, Duh told lawmakers during a legislative hearing.
He said his ministry is still trying to communicate with China and Japan in the hope that they will change their policies of banning all products from manufacturers affected by the problematic oils.
In the latest food scare, two oil processing units of Ting Hsin International Group have been found to have been using fats and oils intended for animal feed in many of their products sold downstream to food makers, which eventually made their way onto consumers' plates.
One of the latest victims is Uni-President Enterprises, which has had to recall 17 beef-flavored instant noodles with condiments made of questionable tallow supplied by Ting Hsin.
According to Duh, the incident had caused at least NT$12 billion (US$395 million) in losses to Taiwan's food sector as of last week. That figure does not include those suffered by Uni-President.
Only a small portion of Taiwan's food products are exported, Duh noted.
Source: WantChinaTimes.com