SHENZHEN launched a food supervisory system Monday that can trace all food back to its source.

    A new food safety law will come into force Thursday. The system will cover all supermarkets citywide next year and expand to other food safety supervision sections, the Southern Metropolis Daily reported yesterday.

    About 400 representatives of food suppliers attended a Monday meeting held by the city’s food and drug administration, which publicly explained the city’s tracing system, along with a credit system, for the first time.

    Wang Dawei, the deputy director of the administration’s risk monitoring and management department, said the new food safety law will come into force Thursday. A feature of the new law is setting up a national tracing system for food.

    The administration began creating a citywide tracing system last year, setting up a verification procedure covering prepackaged food production, supply, distribution and retail. The system requires companies to provide certificates and invoices to the system.

    The system is part of a citywide project launched last year with the goal of raising the city’s food safety level to international standards within five years at an investment of 2.44 billion yuan (US$381.25 million).

    After registering in the system, a supplier’s products and operating information will be shared to all supermarkets around the city, enabling retailers to check a supplier’s qualifications, food examination reports and supply records, and saving time and effort for companies as they can provide certificates and invoices online instead of handing in paper materials repeatedly.

    Wang said the system will cut costs for food producers, suppliers and retailers when coordinating food safety control, while enforcing legal responsibilities for companies.

    A trial run of the system started in June at some supermarket chains in Shenzhen. Rainbow, Vanguard, Walmart and Shirble stores took part in the trial.

    “All of our newly arrived goods have to be registered and approved in the system before we can put them on sale,” said Li Bing, the purchasing director of the Shirble department store.

    About 1,400 companies have registered on the system as of Sept. 18, with 30,000 certificates processed and 15,000 pieces of product information recorded.

    Another 20 chain supermarkets will be connected to the system next year, when the system will extend to agricultural products, catering and online trading.

    “To achieve food safety requires more than a traceable system,” Wang said, adding that companies perform poorly will be blacklisted.

    In the future, information about a food source and a company’s records will be available by scanning a QR code on the packaging, according to Zhou Peng, the deputy director of the Shenzhen Institute of Standards and Technology.

    The administration also said a citywide standard for certificates and invoices that companies have to provide will be introduced.

    (Zhang Yang)