China's food export back to growth in March

BEIJING, May 11 (Xinhua) -- China's food export reached 2.62 billion U.S.
dollars in March, up 8.9 percent from a year earlier, presenting the first
year-on-year growth in the last five months, said General Administration of
Customs (GAC) here on Monday.

Export of fruit led the growth, rising 23.5 percent in March. Seafood was
up 16.2 percent year on year.

Food export totaled 7.17 U.S. dollars in the first quarter, down 5.5
percent year on year.

The country's food export had been falling since October 2008, affected by
the global financial crisis and the baby milk scandal that left six infants dead
and almost 300,000 ill, said the GAC in an online analysis on food export posted
on Monday.

The situation improved as governmental and industry efforts to strengthen
food safety supervision and expand export began to pay off, according the
analysis.

The overall demand for food was still there, said the GAC.

However, the shadow of the global economic downturn and concerns over food
safety could still be felt, reflected in the year-on-year drop of the food
exported such as vegetable and fruit juice, canned mushrooms, meat products and
live poultry, according to the administration.

Dairy scandal casts lasting shadow over China's food exports

GUANGZHOU, May 7 (Xinhua) -- Visitors were scarce at the Guangdong Dongtai
Dairy Products booth during the third phase of the 105th China Import and Export
Fair, also called the Canton Fair.

The third phase of China's largest trade event began here Sunday and ended
Thursday.

Xu Haoming, who's in charge of external trade for Dongtai, said he wasn't
surprised by the lack of visitors.

Based in the Jiedong economic development zone of south China's Guangdong
Province, Dongtai specializes in dairy products such as baby milk powder. It
exports to Asian and African countries.

Demand has fallen because of the global downturn, but that's common to all
industries, said Xu. The dairy industry has an additional problem.

"The blow to Chinese food businesses from food safety problems such as the
melamine contamination scandal last year" has been almost fatal, said Xu.

The melamine-adulteration milk and baby formula scandal, which left six
infants dead and almost 300,000 ill, came to light last September. It had a
swift impact on China's dairy product exports.

According to the General Administration of Customs, dairy exports dropped
10.4 percent last year to 121,000 tonnes after the scandal made the headlines.

Xu said his company's exports are down 50 percent.

"The melamine contamination scandal has passed, but its negative impact
lingers. There is a trust crisis for the Chinese dairy products industry," said
Xu, "What concerns me most at the moment is how the credibility of Chinese food
could be restored."

Dongtai is not the only company in China to feel the impact of concern over
food-safety problems.

Century International, a trading company based in east China's Dalian City,
Liaoning Province, didn't bring milk powder to the Canton Fair.

Han Wenjun, the commercial representative of Century International,
explained that many countries, especially those in Europe, the United States and
Japan, had raised standards for food imports after the melamine scandal. His
company's export business had essentially vanished, he said, and the firm had
been forced to shift to importing milk powder to survive.

Yue Jianping with Jinghong Foodstuffs, based in Quanzhou City, east China's
Fujian Province, said the melamine scandal had tarnished the image of the entire
Chinese food industry.

"The lollipops made by my company are free of toxic substances such as
melamine, but we've felt the sting of the scandal and still have to make
explanations from time to time," said Yue.

Thousands or even tens of thousands of companies might face similar
questions. As of 2008, China had an estimated 500,000 "large-scale" food
processing companies, along with 350,000 small and medium-sized ones, and more
than 20 million privately owned businesses producing and selling food products.
Authorities last year investigated an average of 200 fake food cases a day,
mainly among smaller producers.

Chinese produce, fish and dairy items are rapidly becoming part of the
global food chain. Food exports totaled 31 billion U.S. dollars from January to
November 2008, up 13.8 percent from the same period in 2007.

CREDIBILITY CRISIS

Xu said his company tried during the Canton fair to get the message out to
overseas clients that most Chinese food was safe, and food scandals were
sporadic and caused by a few businesses.

Ye Caihong with Aixin Foodstuff of Xiamen City, Fujian, said her company
had tightened product quality control and inspection this year.

Liu Dawei, deputy manager with the external trade department of Linjin Food
Industry of Anhui Province, said the credibility crisis had forced Chinese food
businesses to pay more attention to product quality control.

Liu said his company, a jelly maker, had opened a technical research and
development center this year and improved quality monitoring and testing.

IMAGE IMPROVEMENT

The government has taken steps to improve food safety.

The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top
legislature, adopted a Food Safety Law in late February. The law stipulates that
"only those items proved to be safe and necessary in food production are allowed
to be listed as food additives."

The law, which will take effect on June 1, also says food producers may
only use approved additives. Companies that break the law face possible
temporary or permanent closure.

Also, the Ministry of Health issued a circular in March to its local
offices, urging them to step up prevention of food contamination and monitoring
of food-borne illnesses. The circular covered the 16 provinces, autonomous
regions and municipalities where food problems have been most prevalent.

Health Minister Chen Zhu said the ministry would create a national database
covering food contamination and food-borne illnesses within two years. He also
ordered hospitals and other health organizations to report food poisoning and
other food-related illnesses promptly.

Huo Jianguo, chairman of the China Chamber of Commerce for Import and
Export of Foodstuffs, Native Produce and Animal By-Product, said his
organization had introduced new management methods to improve food safety.

These methods include encouraging and supporting processing businesses to
build fixed ties with raw material suppliers and encouraging collective
procurement.

Some Chinese companies have embarked on construction of a food safety
monitoring chain.

Fan Xiaoshan, manager with the tomato and fruit marketing department of
COFCO Xinjiang Tunhe, said it was imperative to exercise a full process of
monitoring system from farmland to table to ensure food safety.

Although dairy exporters are still struggling, some foreign markets have
reopened.

Xu noted that Turkey had lifted its ban on Chinese milk powder and the milk
powder traded by his company had been allowed to reenter the market
there.

Science innovations helps dryland farmers deal with food, financial crisis

by Wu Qiang, Karuna Madan

NEW DELHI, May 9 (Xinhua) -- The global food crisis, marked by soaring food price last year, and the current economic meltdown, have inflicted hardships to poor farmers of the semi-arid tropics of Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, including India.

In such a scenario, only crop research and innovation can empower these farmers to cope with the crisis, leading researchers feel, said a international farm expert on Saturday.

Dr. William Dar, Director General of International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), told Xinhua in an interview that the global financial crisis coming closely on the heels of the global food crisis has hit dryland farmers hard.

"These poor dryland farmers have very little margin for risks, and when two shocks come one behind the other, their ability to recover is quite diminished. Although food prices have fallen from their peaks in early 2008, they are still higher than what the prices were before they soared in 2007. This can affect poor dryland farmers, who are usually net food buyers," he said.

ICRISAT, which is based in Patancheru, Andhra Pradesh in central India, is a science-based international organization which conducts research on sorghum, pearl millet, chickpea, pigeon pea and groundnut that support the livelihood of the poor in the semi-arid tropics.

"Due to the financial crisis, there is also a shortfall in credit available to farmers and prices of inputs are also high. This could have an adverse impact on poor farmers, both in terms of reduced investments in agriculture and lesser food for their families," he added.

Dar lamented that the poor farmers of the drylands had no control over global developments.

"At most of the times they do not understand the cause and effect of these changes," he said. "But when scientific innovations help them overcome their day-to-day problems, their resilience to global challenges gets strengthened."

To hasten the speed of crop improvement and overcome limitations inherent to conventional crop breeding, ICRISAT has harnessed crop biotechnology, said Dar.

Using molecular marker assisted selection and breeding, ICRISAT developed a pearl millet hybrid -- HHB 67 Improved -- that is resistant to downy mildew disease, he said.

Using the same technology, ICRISAT scientists in Nairobi identified and transferred genes that confer Striga resistance to sorghum. Striga is among the deadliest weeds in Africa.

In addition to contributing to the national food basket, agriculture in the semi-arid regions of developing countries supports the livelihoods of a large segment of these countries' population.

"In India, for instance, two-thirds of cultivated lands are semi-arid. Hence, an adverse impact on dryland farming can result in decreased livelihood options for a substantial percentage of the population," Dar said.

Dar said scientific innovations can strengthen farmers to deal with situations such as this.

"Even when events happen that are far beyond the control of the dryland farmer, scientific and research-based intervention can give him the resistance to tide over the crisis with less damage," he said.

Eurozone retail sales slightly down in March

Special
Report: Global Financial Crisis

BRUSSELS, May 6 (Xinhua) -- Retail trade volume in the euro zone fell 0.6
percent month on month in March, the European Union's (EU) statistics bureau
Eurostat said Wednesday.

In March, food, drinks and tobacco sales decreased 1.4 percent on a monthly
basis in the 16-nation euro area, while the non-food sector remained unchanged,
Eurostat said.

Year on year, the eurozone retail sales slumped 4.2 percent in March, with
food, drinks and tobacco down 5.2 percent and the non-food sector down 1.9
percent.

Meanwhile in the 27-nation EU, retail sales dropped 0.3 percent from the
previous month and by 3.1 percent from year-ago levels.

Statistics showed that among the EU member states for which data were
available, total retail trade fell in ten, rose in six and remained unchanged in
Denmark and Romania on a monthly basis.

The highest increase was observed in Slovenia, which was 6.8 percent, while
the largest decrease was in Lithuania with a drop of 4.3 percent.

Retail sales are an indication of household demand, one of the three major
economic drivers. With the European economy in crisis and a rising jobless rate,
analysts warned retail sales will shrink as private consumption is set to
fall.

G8 meeting to focus on poverty, food security and market price

ROME, April 14 (Xinhua) -- Group of Eight (G8) agriculture ministers will discuss issues of world hunger, food security and the fluctuation of market prices when they meet in Italy at the coming weekend, Italian Agriculture Minister Luca Zaia said on Tuesday.

He said the theme of "productive identity" will also be key at the two-day G8 agriculture summit to be held from April 18 to 20 in Cison di Valmarino, near Treviso in the Veneto region.

"In agriculture there are two well-defined worlds: those that have agriculture with a productive identity such as Italy, which counts 4,500 typical products, and those that must invent their own agriculture. The latter would like to standardize production, tastes and consumption," the minister said.

The G8 ministers would speak of "real agriculture, practiced by farmers who harvest food from the earth, not by multinationals," as well as the effects of the global economic crisis on world hunger, Zaia said.

He also expressed his hope that the ministerial meeting would result in a "shared document" that would be sent to the G8 summit to be held in July on the Sardinian island of La Maddalena, where G8 heads of state will meet on major global and regional issues.