CHINA REVEALS FIVE-YEAR PUSH TO BOOST FOOD AND DRUG SAFETY

International concern over exports of contaminated Chinese ingredients used in pet food and toothpaste has spurred Beijing to publish its first five-year plan for improving food and drug safety.

The state council's framework for regulation of food and pharmaceuticals is part of longstanding efforts to address what officials acknowledge are "severe" safety problems.

However, Beijing officials have in recent days also highlighted the international implications of incomplete inspection systems, lagging regulation and undisciplined food producers.

"Food safety is not just an issue of law enforcement, it is also related to the health and safety of the people, to the nation's image and to bilateral and even multilateral political relationships," said Li Changjiang, head of China's General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine.

Singapore this week banned the sale of three brands of Chinese-made toothpaste that contained a poisonous chemical, diethylene glycol. The move followed similar action by Latin American countries and a warning from US regulators that toothpaste containing the chemical could be harmful.

In April, pet food that included additives from China apparently contaminated with the industrial chemical melamine was blamed for poisoning thousands of US cats and dogs.

Worries about dangerous food and drug products have been widespread in China for years, and Wen Jiabao, the premier, has made pledges of tougher action a regular feature in his annual "work report".

The release by the state council, or cabinet, of the first "five-year plan" specifically addressing food and drug safety is intended to focus bureaucratic efforts on improving and more strictly implementing supervision of the two industries.

The plan, approved in April but not made public then, does not mark a dramatic shift in emphasis.

But it does call for the creation of systems to monitor food exports that might transmit disease and for residues of drugs in agricultural products and livestock shipments, as well for the "electronic monitoring" of food processing companies.