The United Nations recommends that China institute new food safety laws in order to restore confidence in its food supply. Specifically, the UN calls for revising the country’s basic hygiene law to include the entire food chain. The UN paper also advocates the establishment of one government agency to replace the six agencies that current manage food safety. The greatest challenges, according to the UN, is presented by the country’s 350,000 food enterprises, which employ 10 or fewer people, as well as the many unregistered producers. In total, China has approximately 450,000 food production and processing enterprises. The Chinese government is currently reviewing its draft food safety law. Wal-Mart also recently announced that it will start requiring its suppliers in China and elsewhere to meet higher quality standards throughout the supply chain, starting with apparel.

Source: Associated Press