Dimethyl yellow found in Hsin Tung Yang dried tofu
Taiwan News, Staff Writer
2015-01-29 07:25 PM
TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – The Taipei City health authorities ordered Hsin Tung Yang Co., Ltd. to stop selling a dried bean curd product Thursday after the potentially cancer-causing dimethyl yellow had been found.
Last month, 40 types of dried tofu from ten other producers were alleged to have been contaminated with the same substance, an industrial dye sometimes linked to cancer in animals.
On Tuesday, Taichung ordered five types of dried bean curd from the local Yi Hsin brand removed from shelves after inspectors found excessive levels of preservatives.
The Hsin Tung Yang products had been made at the prominent food company’s plant in the Taoyuan City district of Tayuan, reports said.
Recent inspections turned up 10 types of dried tofu out of 49 tested containing dimethyl yellow, or 20 percent of the sample. The food had been taken from supermarkets and other shops between December 22 and 25, reports said.
While Hsin Tung Yang was the only new firm to have problems and also the best known, other companies which had apparently used dimethyl yellow were named as Yu Hsiang Foods, Tien Su Foods and Mai Jun Foods, the Chinese-language Apple Daily reported.
The questionable Hsin Tung Yang product had been for sale at a bus station near Taipei Main Station, but the company said it was produced at its Tayuan plant from soy beans supplied by a local distributor. According to Hsin Tung Yang, it was not clear at which stage of the process the contamination with dimethyl yellow might have occurred.
Health officials said that because the substance was an industrial dye, its presence in food was completely banned. Violators could face prison sentences up to seven years if damage to health could be proven.
In the run-up to next month’s Lunar New Year holiday, the sale of traditional Taiwanese foods is expected to spike. The health authorities usually also step up the pace of their inspections of such foods at the same time.
