POLITICAL advisers in Shenzhen have urged the city authorities to impose stricter punishments on unqualified food suppliers and strengthen supervision of food safety, aiming to be more like Hong Kong, where food safety is far less of an issue.

    Some advisers suggested a zero-tolerance attitude towards substandard food at a seminar Sunday, according to yesterday’s South Metropolis Daily.

    One of the advisers, Li Yulan, presented at the seminar the results of food safety inspections spanning the first three quarters in 2014, which showed that slightly more than 5 percent of food products and production venues inspected were unqualified.

    “The result was not satisfying and we should spare no effort to guarantee our residents that the food is safety,” Lu said at the seminar.

    Another adviser at the seminar, Zhang Mingzheng, suggested that the local government enforce stricter punishments to regulate the food industry so that lawbreakers won’t get away with producing unqualified food.

    “We usually send out only a warning, suspend a business or impose a fine of 5,000 yuan (US$800) when we track down illegal food producers and distributors, but that’s not enough,” said Zhang.

    Fan Chengwei advised the supervising departments to blacklist illicit merchants and prohibit them from re-entering the food industry. Other members recommended Hong Kong as a role model for Shenzhen to improve its food regulation standards.

    Hong Kong has a more effective rule of law in relation to food industry and otherwise, which is the leading reason mainland shoppers flock in droves to purchase groceries across the border.

    The rate of qualified food-industry businesses in Shenzhen (which include those involved in production and circulation, as well as restaurants) was 97.2 percent for 2014. More than 99 percent of Hong Kong’s food-industry businesses, however, passed qualifications last year.

    The two cities share a slight difference in the items being investigated and the criteria, but the sample size for inspections in Hong Kong is even greater than that of Shenzhen.

    “Our government should invest more in efforts to collect and check a greater sample size in order to improve food quality in Shenzhen and thereby draw more people nationwide to buy groceries here, rather than joining the long lines in Hong Kong,” said Li. (Zhang Qian)