China launches crackdown on toxic lunch box makers
March 17th, 2011 - 4:44 pm ICT by IANSBeijing, March 17 (IANS) China has launched a crackdown after a survey revealed that 40 percent of manufacturers are selling disposable lunch boxes that can be toxic.
Dong Jinshi, executive vice-president of the International Food Packaging Association, a Hong Kong-based non-government organisation, said Wednesday that among 17 disposable box manufacturers they probed, only 10 were producing quality products.
These 17 companies supply 80 percent of lunch boxes in Hong Kong, according to the China Daily.
China Central Television reported in 1999 that foam lunch boxes release toxic substances such as dioxins.
The Beijing bureau of quality and technical supervision closed the factory making the foam lunch boxes following a raid Tuesday - World Consumer Rights Day.
Around 15 billion disposable lunch boxes are used nationwide every year. Of these, more than 90 percent are made of plastic, the NGO said. The country has about 1,400 disposable lunch box makers.
Each lunch box costs around 0.15 yuan but some makers use cheap materials such as industrial calcium carbonate to reduce production costs. And these could be toxic.
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