Toxic Imports: Overview : SBS Insight

Overview

Are Australians safe when buying food and other products manufactured overseas?

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China and other developing nations are increasingly being relied upon as Australia's main suppliers of food, toys and manufactured goods.

But this year, imports have been put under the spotlight following the melamine milk scandal in China, which resulted in the deaths of four babies and made 50,000 children ill.

So what are the regulations governing our imported foods and products? Who is responsible, and which products are being checked and tested at the border?

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Meet the Guests

Alexandra Harney

Alexandra Harney is the Hong Kong-based author of The China Price: The True Cost of Chinese Competitive Advantage. She spent nine years at the Financial Times, covering China, Japan, and the UK. Before joining the Financial Times, she researched Japanese defense policy at Tokyo University’s graduate school and worked as an aide to a Japanese politician. The Princeton University graduate was born in Washington, DC. Check out her blog at http://thechinaprice.blogspot.com

Kim Hochen

Bundaberg linesman Kim Hochen noticed a rash after he started wearing his new Ergon Energy uniform. His wife Cherryl began getting headaches after she washed the clothing. When he realised colleagues and their wives had the same complaints, Kim threw the garment out. His rash and headaches disappeared. Kim is one of more than 200 Queensland energy workers who complained to the company of reactions to the garments, which were found to contain very high levels of formaldehyde. They were recalled.

Nicola Mellare

Nicola Mellare's three-year-old son Dominic was rushed to hospital in August when he sucked on a pierced icepack. The icepack boasted of being non-toxic, but tests eventually revealed it was one of 22 varieties sold here that were filled with a toxic, cheaper substance - ethylene glycol, aka anti-freeze. Nicola has four young children, a law degree and freelances as a writer, yet has made time to lobby government agencies in a bid to change the way products are imported into Australia.

Steve McCutcheon

Steve McCutcheon has been CEO of Food Standards Australia New Zealand since October 2007. Previously he held a number of senior positions in the Federal Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry - where he led the team that developed the new food regulatory framework for Australia and New Zealand.

Christopher Zinn

Consumers' advocate Christopher Zinn is a former journalist who joined Australian Consumers’ Association, CHOICE, last year. He worked in print, radio and television for 25 years, including a stint at the Guardian and Daily Telegraph newspapers in London. CHOICE argues for a nationalised, preventive, efficient system that forces importers to be responsible for the safety of their products.

Kevin Carpenter

Biochemist Kevin Carpenter made the internationally-significant discovery in November that Australia’s Toy of the Year, Bindeez, was coated with a substance the body converts to date-rape drug GHB. When an unconscious child was admitted to Westmead it took a series of complex chemistry connections to confirm that the cause of the child’s coma was the substance found in the popular beads. The finding by the NSW Biochemical Genetic Service department head lead to global recalls of the toy.

Bob Weymouth

Bob Weymouth heads up the Australian Competition and Consumer Commissio n (ACCC) in Victoria. Bob became regional director with the ACCC in Adelaide in 1998, and in 2006 transferred to the same role in Melbourne. He has spent 24 years in a variety of roles within the Australian Customs Service, working closely at various times with the petroleum, wine and spirits, brewing, and transport industries.