China investigates more milk products for melamine

[Coventina]

Source: Associated Press

BEIJING (AP) — China is investigating milk products produced by one of the country's largest dairies and a unit of France's Groupe Danone SA for an unapproved additive and melamine. Both companies insisted their products were safe.

The Shanghai Municipal Bureau of Quality and Technical Supervision said Thursday in a one-sentence statement that the bureau was looking into "the quality and safety of Dumex milk powder" but did not give other details. The Mengniu Dairy Group Co. is being investigated by China's quality watchdog for an unapproved protein additive one of its lines of milk.

The official Xinhua News Agency said that investigations into Dumex, a subsidiary of Danone, were centered on whether the company produced infant formula contaminated with melamine, an industrial chemical used in the manufacture of plastics and fertilizer.

Last year, at least six Chinese babies died and nearly 300,000 were sickened with kidney stones and other problems by milk tainted with the chemical. The scandal, one of the worst food contamination crises to hit China, underscores the government's chronic problems with policing product quality.



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