China’s Food Safety: Challenges and Opportunities Pei-Hwa Ho

Background Wanted to promote a natural bacteria-based fertilizer and insecticide. It can increase yield, improve quality, and soften soils, and has high return on investments for fruits, veggies, and teas. Went deep into the farm villages for trials and develop sales and channels.

Findings Most farms were run by independent farm families who do not (and can not) rely on farm income to make a living. Most young workers went to work in cities and only return during harvesting season. The market is one price fits all, so farmers pursue maximum weight, not quality. Many illicit and fake products, main culprit.

Findings Lack of modern agriculture knowledge Stick with NPK Use growth hormone or other products to increase yield Most Chinese soil are in poor state Farmers don’t consume the products they sold to market, they grow their own food separately.

Resulting in… Food nutrition content way down Things don’t taste good, don’t smell good Soil contains huge amount of chemicals Soil depleted of minerals and organic matters

And Pollution Chromium creeps up in well water Other heavy metals in water Pollution caused by overabundant fertilizers spilling into creeks and rivers Air pollution

And Safety Issues Residues of Pesticides and Herbicides Overuse of growth hormones and plant growth regulators Leaner pork and beef with clenbuterol (banned in the US and EU,US uses ractopamine )

Fundamental Challenges Lack of trust and good consumer protection mechanism Falsified and fake products everywhere in the agriculture supply chain Agriculture’s long cycle time and risks (pricing, weather, natural disasters) made is not ideal for Chinese investors

Organic? Organic Chemistry: Study of compound or materials that contains carbon (with exceptions like diamond, cyanide, carbon dioxide) or things that can only be produced in a living organism (with exceptions too in modern day technology) Organic Food: Food produced without synthetic chemicals (pesticides, fertilizers, etc.)

China’s Organic Foods Most are not organic (personal observation) Price too high to be popular Consumers just want “poison-free” food

Talking Numbers If water and soil are not contaminated It won’t cost too much more to grow safe and healthy crops with modern know-how Not using fertilizers and pesticides won’t give you healthy crops

Where Thing Are Organic retailer, lohaocity.com Country Fair / Farmers’ Market – Subscribe (and maybe work on) your own land like littledonkeyfarm.com Subscribe or buy online with home delivery like noahorganic.com or oabc.cc or tonysfarm.com

Opportunities A foreign brand assisted quality system Safe and poison-free products instead of organic Localized sales and distribution system