French Find Melamine In Chinese Organic Soya

Just a few days after it was revealed that a consignment of Chinese soymeal shipped to Holland was tainted with melamine, another problem has turned up, this time in France.

I guess if someone, somewhere is prepared to pay £600/tonne for something, and that something comes from China, then you can expect that the financial rewards to "enhance" the product are too tempting for some.

France's largest agricultural co-operative Terrena has revealed that organic soya imported from China earlier in the summer has now been found to contain up to 46 times the EU permitted levels for melamine.

As a result of the findings nearly a thousand tonnes of organic soya in the French town of Mervent has been quarantined. An estimated 300mt of the consignment had already been incorporated into animal feed, and distributed to more than 100 poultry farmers in the area, before the problem came to light.

The French authorities say that the incident poses no risk to human health.