The Taiwan Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said Tuesday it discovered and intercepted 29 different substandard food import items between Feb. 8 and Feb. 15, many of which contained excessive levels of pesticide residue.
According to the FDA, products that failed to pass the pesticide check included fresh strawberries, melons, and persimmons from Japan, as well as fresh cherries from Chile and ginseng from South Korea.
These items were popular imported Lunar New Year gifts, which is probably also why some of them had more than one batch reported as substandard, FDA Northern Center head Chen Ching-yu (???) said.
The border inspections also found other substandard food imports, including 2,779 kilograms of edible bird's nests from Vietnam that contained illegal preservatives, Chen said.
It was the first time in six months that substandard edible bird's nests were intercepted, the FDA said.
According to the agency, all problematic products were either returned to their country of origin or destroyed according to Taiwan's regulations.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel