“There are few issues more deeply and universally felt in China than the safety of its food; after years of scandals on cooking oil sifted from gutters, glow-in-the-dark pork, deadly infant formula, and so on …. So it was grim news last fall when Chinese reporters uncovered a network of ‘special farms’ dedicated to providing Party leaders with top-quality vegetables, chicken, pork, rice, beef, fish, and tea oil. In the province of Zhejiang, for instance, forty ‘high-class eco-farms’ were said to have been earmarked to supply the land-resource department, water conservancy, agricultural units, and other government offices. (What are we to make of the fact that the offices receiving special food are exactly the ones overseeing the public’s supply?)”
— “Is a Clue to China’s Future on Its Dinner Tables?” Evan Osnos, New Yorker
More:
“In China, what you eat tells who you are,” Barbara Demick, Los Angeles Times
“Chinese meat glows in the dark,” Patrick Winn, GlobalPost
“52 arrested for producing, selling gutter oil,” Xinhua via China Daily
“China dairy destroys tainted milk promises tough checks,” BBC News
“China sentences 113 in tainted pork scandal,” AP via CBS News
“4 held over cancer chemical bean curd,” ShanghaiDaily.com
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