Posted on 04/27/2007 6:50:19 PM PDT by mom4kittys
WASHINGTON - Federal agents searched facilities of a dog and cat food manufacturer and one of its suppliers as part of an investigation into the widening recall of pet products, the companies disclosed Friday.
Food and Drug Administration officials searched an Emporia, Kan., pet food plant operated by Menu Foods and the Las Vegas offices of ChemNutra Inc., according to the companies.
Menu Foods made many of the more than 100 brands of pet food recalled since March 16 because of contamination by the chemical melamine. ChemNutra supplied the manufacturer with wheat gluten, one of the two ingredients tainted by melamine used in recalled pet products. Both companies said they were cooperating with the investigation.
Menu Foods also said the U.S. Attorney's offices in Kansas and the western district of Missouri have targeted the company as part of misdemeanor investigations into whether it violated the federal Food, Drug & Cosmetic Act. The sale of adulterated food is a misdemeanor.
The FDA also is looking at all other ingredients imported by ChemNutra, and trying to reconcile what it imported with what it supplied to customers, said agency spokeswoman Julie Zawisza.
Import records obtained by The Associated Press show that since May 2006 alone ChemNutra also imported 440,000 pounds of the second suspect pet food ingredient, rice protein concentrate, from the same Chinese trading agent that handled exports of the tainted wheat gluten.
It's unknown if ChemNutra's rice protein concentrate was contaminated. Limited testing suggests it wasn't. However, another company's imports of that same ingredient, albeit from a different source, have been found to be tainted.
Ten of the 11 containers of rice protein concentrate imported by ChemNutra over the last year went to undisclosed pet food companies, spokesman Steve Stern said. The 11th is under quarantine and being tested. But just one of the other 10 is known to have been tested; results from those tests, done last week, showed it was not contaminated, Stern said.
The origin within China of the wheat gluten and rice protein concentrate remains murky. For example, ChemNutra's source for the two vegetable proteins, Suzhou Textile Import and Export Co., told The AP that food ingredients aren't part of its business — but that employees often take on side deals. Stern said ChemNutra dealt with the company's president.
The FDA has blocked wheat gluten imports from a second Chinese company, Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development Co. That company has told AP it bought the ingredient from other undisclosed firms and then sold it to Suzhou Textile.
Meanwhile, rice protein concentrate imported by the second company, Wilbur-Ellis Co., has tested positive for melamine. It came from a different Chinese source, Futian Biology Technology Co. Ltd.
Last week, the FDA blocked rice protein concentrates from that source. And on Friday, American Nutrition Inc. became the final of five pet food companies that Wilbur-Ellis supplied with the tainted ingredient to recall a variety of products.
An unknown number of dogs and cats have been sickened or died after eating chemical-laced pet food.
Menu Foods said it faces more than 50 lawsuits. It in turn has sued ChemNutra.
___
Associated Press writer Christopher Bodeen in Shanghai, China, contributed to this report.
On the Net:
Food and Drug Administration on pet food recall: http://tinyurl.com/2bjasu
I’m glad to hear this...
Perhaps it is time for us to ban import from China of any ingestible substances.
I think we should ban all imports of chinese garbage.
The FDA appears to have fallen down on the job. Also, according to a story posted here I think yesterday, ChemNeutra only issued the recall when one of their customers, Iams, threatened to do so first if they didn’t.
I hope someone will also be checking to see whether any of this stuff got into the human food chain.
Yes.
Why the hell are we buying food from China?
Blah, blah, blah. Either check the ChiCom facilities or suspend ALL food shipments to the USA from the yellow peril.
Dog food market gonna be wide open when these companies fold.
Guess who will step in to take up the slack...
I don’t understand why we are buying this crap from China either. This food safety thinkg is new to me, but now it has gotten my attention. I buying all this junk from China a liberal or a conservative platform? (Pardon me if it is a stupid question) We are quite capable of growing most of the things we import from China right here in the USA.
FGS we are importing chinese crawfish to LOUISIANA and it is less expensive to buy!!! Ridiculous!!!
That is correct.
Cuz the government is trying to see how many farmers they can put out of business. My mom’s got a farm in N. Dakota and she said the price for a bushel of wheat isn’t much more than it was 50 years ago. Checked the price of cereal lately? I’d like to know who’s getting rich, because it’s not the farmer. If she’s lucky she gets enough to pay property tax and hopefully a little profit, but not much.
“I buying all this junk from China a liberal or a conservative platform? (Pardon me if it is a stupid question)”
Yes. Most conservatives support “free trade”.
I have no doubt that the WTO is the reason we buy the crap. In fact I suspect we have no choice by WTO rules
“Guess who will step in to take up the slack...”
Who? I have no idea.
Thanks mom4kittys for the ping.
I went to the grocery store today and looked at lots of labels on my food. They told what company made the product, but there is no clue to what companies are supplying the ingredients.
Wouldn’t it be better for our economy if we supported our local farmers and fishermen? I don’t understand.
Wouldn’t it be better for our economy if we supported our local farmers and fishermen? I don’t understand.
Who is getting rich on your mom’s farm?
The shareholders of the bank to whom she pays interest on the loans she needs to take out every year to buy the seed and fertilizer.
The shareholders of the agro companies that sell the fertilizer.
The shareholders of the companies that sell the final product, and to a lesser extent the shareholders of the companies that prepare the product.
And since all of that stuff can be done by Chinese at a tenth of the price, the shareholders make a lot more money by doing as much as possible over there. And that is why America, whose heartland is full of wheat, is buying wheat gluten in China to put in dog food.
That’s whose making the money.
If you labor - if you are selling the time and physical movements to do anything at all - then you are merely a commodity - labor - and a cost center, and profits are earned by squeezing you as far as you can be squeezed, until of course you are replaced with a Chinese slave.
It’s just business, after all, and if you want to stop Chinese imports from sweeping away the industrial and agricultural base, well then CLEARLY you’re a left wing socialist protectionist wacko yahoo, of course.
Exactly—we don’t know where the ingredients come from!
ooooohhh that makes me angry. I guess it’s the same theory as outsourcing so many jobs to India?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.