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Dinamilk shut down over quality
The Department of Health has temporarily suspended the operation of HCM City-based Truyen Tam Co. Ltd for producing low-quality powdered milk.
Department inspectors broke into the Dinamilk firm in Tan Phu District owned by Truyen Tam Co. Ltd last Friday after a report was published in the Tuoi Tre newspaper about the "super cheap" products it was selling.
Inspectors then found that the company was violating several food hygiene and safety regulations in producing the Dinamilk branded products.
They found that while the packaging of imported milk materials showed they were of Australian origin, the finished products mentioned New Zealand.
Dinamilk products are labelled as containing vitamins, DHA, lysine and other ingredients, but inspectors found no evidence Truyen Tam Co. ever bought these substances.
The company also could not show the Product Certification licence granted by the Food Safety and Hygiene Department.
Inspectors decided to temporarily suspend the firm’s operations and collected five samples for further testing.
At the same time, Tran Thanh Thao, Deputy Director of the Tien Giang Department of Health, announced three milk brands of highly dubious quality. Dinamilk, Kinder and Supper Milk were found to carry labels indicating much higher protein content while tests found they contained just 8.94 per cent, 8,4 per cent and 4.31 per cent respectively.
Thao said these milk products had been widely used by kindergartens in the province.
She also said that interdisciplinary inspection teams would continue to have samples of milk products tested
The Department of Health would warn kindergartens about milk products violating food hygiene and safety regulations and monitor the situation more closely, she added.
Also on Friday, the chief of the Government Office, Nguyen Xuan Phuc, forwarded instructions from the Prime Minister about the need to stabilise milk prices to the ministries of Industry and Trade, Finance and Health.
The three ministries have been asked to prepare a report on the milk pricing situation before July 30.
The prime ministerial instructions followed reports from the Department of Competition Management that milk prices in Viet Nam were 20 to 220 per cent higher than regional countries, even while import taxes were lower.
Department officials and other experts remarked that importers and retailers were taking undue advantage of customers preference for milk products originating from Denmark, France, the Netherlands or Japan in the belief that they are of much higher quality.
Ho Tat Thang, deputy head of the Viet Nam Standards and Consumers Protection Association said they had submitted their petition to the Ministry of Finance, also on Friday.
The association proposed that the impending tax increase on milk material imports be deferred and milk price management be strengthened instead. The tax increase can be considered again after milk prices had stabilised to a more reasonable level, it said.
vietnamnews
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