Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/07/13
By: Yang Shu-min and S.C. Chang
Taipei, July 13 (CNA) A Yunlin County rice producer was fined NT$4.03 million
Vietnamese long-grained rice.
(US$129,800) on Monday for mixing Vietnamese rice into two products sold as “Taiwanese rice” to a Taoyuan manufacturer and for refusing to cooperate with investigators.
The producer, known in Chinese as Chang’s Agricultural Processing Factory (張農產加工廠), was suspected of using Vietnamese rice in the long-grained and round-grained glutinous “Made in Taiwan” rice it sold to Chia Ho Rice Factory (嘉禾碾米廠) in Taoyuan.
The Agriculture and Food Agency (AFA) under the Council of Agriculture began investigating the case on June 10, and it asked the owner of the rice processing company, Chang Hsin-chieh (張信傑), to provide an explanation to the agency’s central Taiwan office in Taichung by 6:15 p.m. on June 18.
Chang did not appear until 8 p.m. that day and insisted that everything he sold to the Taoyuan company was supplied by upstream Taiwanese vendors. He then demanded that the AFA re-check its findings. [FULL STORY]
