Laws of the People's Republic of China

Circular of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the People's Republic of China on Further Strengthening the Administration of the Inspection and Quarantine of Peanut Export

Guo Zhi Jian Shi Han [2006] No. 613

The inspection and quarantine bureaus directly under the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine:

As one of our country's traditional staple agricultural products, peanuts are exported to more than 100 countries and regions, with the annual export amount 778,000 tons, equivalent to more than $0.6 billion. In recent years, the peanut export amount of our country has increased steadily and its quality safety has been improved somewhat. However, developed countries have been increasingly strict with peanut safety requirement. The production and management as well as the process control of peanut whose plantation and initial processing is very popular in our country are not perfect. In order to further strengthen the administration of the inspection and quarantine of the export of peanuts and to comprehensively improve the quality safety of the export of peanuts, the relevant issues are notified as follows:

1.

To get a clear understanding of the current situation and to nail down the work direction

All the bureaus concerned should be clearly aware of the serious situation faced with the peanut export in our country. On the one hand, import countries are increasingly strict with the quality safety index. The positive list system of Japan has increased the inspection item of pesticide residues in the peanut to 290 and implements the uniform standard of 0.01mg/kg for the pesticide residue items which are not clearly limited. On the other hand, the quality safety of exported peanut in our countries has many problems. First, the cases being reported due to the excess of alflatoxin are annually increasing, such cases reported by the European Union increased from 53 in 2004 to 76 in 2005; the cases where the excess of alflatoxin in the peanut exported to Japan are also increasing strikingly, in February 2006 the excess rate reached 3.47% and was ordered to be investigated. Second, the excess of pesticide remnant in the exported peanut is also serious. The Japanese authority has ordered checking Daminozido in the peanut exported hereto and supervising and checking Acetochlor in the proportion of 50%. Third, the cases where heavy metal pollution and the use of addictive against the law are also more and more serious, for instance, the excess of cadmium in the peanuts exported to Australia and the Sodium Cyclamate prohibited in Japan in the finished peanut products exported to Japan has been found.

All the authorities should attach great importance to it, change their minds, research and analyze the situation and the problems faced nowadays in an earnest manner, actively explore them and take feasible and effective measures to further strengthen the supervision and administration of plantation origin, production and processing, storage and transportation and the quality safety control, continuously improve the quality of inspection and quarantine work so as to promote the development of China's peanut export.

2.

To strengthen the process control and to improve the work effectiveness

The pollution of peanut aflatoxin may happen in every link or process of plantation, reaping, drying, shelling, storage, processing and transportation, so the whole-process supervision should be carried out in order to solve problems radically. In order to improve its whole-process quality safety control upon the peanut exported to such countries and regions as European Union and Japan, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine has formulated Quality Safety Control Requirement of Exported Peanut (for Trial Implementation) (Appendix, hereinafter referred to as Control Requirement). All the bureaus shall organize the relevant enterprises to earnestly study and learn the Control Requirement herein, to guide enterprises to establish the whole-process quality safety control system and traceability system, and to increase their efficiency in the control of hazardous pollutants such as aflatoxin in exported peanut.

Where the content of such harmful material in the exported peanuts as aflatoxin, pesticide remnants, heavy metal does not meet the requirement of the import country, these peanuts may not be given clearance.

3.

To strengthen the personnel training and improve their inspection capability

All the bureaus shall carry out training of relevant laws and rule, professional knowledge and quality safety control system in European Union, Japan and China toward the managers who process peanut production and processing, urge enterprises to establish and perfect the self-examination and self-control system of such poisonous materials as aflatoxin. The enterprises who intend to export peanut to European Union and Japan must establish the inspection lab of aflatoxin equipped with the inspection personnel who meet the requirement, and carry out contrast experiment with the inspection and quarantine authorities to ensure the preciseness of the inspection result of alfatoxin in exported peanut material and finished products and to improve the self-examination and self-control capability.

4.

To strengthen the inspection of the remnant of pesticide and to reduce the export risk

All the relevant authorities shall, in accordance with the Inspection and Control Plan of the Pesticide Remnant in Food of Plant Origin as well as the local situation, do well the inspection of the poisonous products such as aflatoxin, pesticide, and heavy metal as well the remnant control work, establish the relevant data, persuade the export enterprises from purchasing peanut material from the seriously polluted areas, and reduce the risk of standard excess of poisonous material in exported products.

5.

To carry out supervision and inspection to ensure its effective implementation

All the bureaus shall undertake comprehensive inspection upon the quality safety control system of the relevant enterprises and inspection and quarantine of the exported products. Once the peanut herein does not meet the requirement, the authorities shall urge the enterprise to rectify itself to ensure the effective implementation of the Control Requirement from the plantation of raw material to every link of the export. The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine shall undertake supervision and inspection upon the implementation of the Control Requirement and to report the relevant situation to the whole system.

Once all the bureaus find problems in the process of inspection and quarantine of exported peanut, they shall deal with them and report them to the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine.

Appendix: Quality Safety Control Requirement of Exported Peanut

The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine

August 7, 2006 Appendix: Quality Safety Control Requirement of Exported Peanut (for Trial Implementation)

In order to guide and urge the farmer of peanut for export and peanut production and process enterprises to establish and perfect the measures of quality safety control in such links as peanut plantation, reaping, purchase, shelling, processing, package, transport and inspection, and to comprehensively improve the quality safety control of exported peanut, the present Requirement is formulated in accordance with the principle of Good Agricultural Practice (GAP), Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) and Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point(HACCP).

1

Control requirement of farm land

1.1

choice of farm land

The farmer shall plant peanut for export on the land which is characterized by sound drainage and irrigation condition, rich in sand and organic material, free from numerous eelworm and other underground pests.

1.2

field management

The farmers shall avoid the damage incurred to peanut and legumen by agricultural operation, and take measures to reduce the field pollution of peanut aflatoxin. Where it is successively hot and droughty 30 or 50 days before peanut reap, the field herein shall be irrigated promptly, yet the depth of water may not exceed 1/3 of the dyke; where it is excessively rainy, the dyke shall be cleaned to drain water to prevent the mildew and rot of peanut.

The peanut farm land shall be rotated in order to reduce the propagation and proliferation of underground pesticide and aflatoxin. Deep plough shall be taken to provide sound conditions for the germination, radication, rooting and the growth of legumen, when the peanut farm land is free.

1.3

the usage of pesticide

The planters shall, in accordance with the plantation protection guideline of "give priority to prevention, comprehensive treatment", comprehensively use such prevention measures as agriculture, physics, chemistry, biology to control pesticides. The inspection and quarantine authorities shall correctly choose the pesticide products which meet the prescriptions of the relevant authorities of the importers and China, purchase pesticide at the pesticide sellers who have the relevant qualifications, strictly observe the relevant prescriptions to apply pesticide during the safety period of pesticide, and reduce pesticide remnant to the scope allowed by the importers and China.

1.4

survey of the pollution of pesticide remnant, heavy metal, and aflatoxin

The inspection and quarantine authority shall guide the export enterprises to undertake survey upon the pollution of pesticide remnant, heavy metal and aflatoxin in the farm land. Sample in the survey shall be representative and be properly stored. Measures against moisture shall be taken to prevent mildew to guarantee the preciseness of the survey, and the relevant documents and archives shall be properly stored.

1.5

source code of peanut plantation

The serial number of farmland shall be on the township basis with its postal code as its plantation serial number.

2.

Control requirement of peanut reap and drying

2.1

Peanuts shall be reaped promptly after they become ripe. The reaped peanut shall be spread out in the ventilated place for drying. Peanuts may not be heaped together and may not be drenched by rain in order to prevent the pollution of aflatoxin and mold in the peanut.

2.2

The reaped and dried peanuts shall be picked promptly and be stored or shelled after the moisture has been reduced to less than 10%. The stored peanuts shall be covered with a cover of sound air permeability to prevent mildew of part of the peanuts.

3.

The requirement of purchase control

3.1

The peanut purchase enterprises shall establish operation standard of peanut purchase, clarify quality demand, check and acceptance requirement and standard. The purchaser of raw peanut shall skillfully master the requirement of purchase control.

3.2

Peanut export enterprises shall in light of the surroundings purchase the peanut which is free from pollution, low pollution of aflatoxin(the content of aflatoxin B1 lower than 2PPB, the content of aflatoxin lower than 4PPB and its positive sample rate is lower than 5%) with the pesticide remnant and heavy metal meeting the requirement of the importer. Sample inspection shall be undertaken before the purchase. The relevant authorities shall purchase the peanut whose quality safety items accord with the requirement of the importers, and do well the relevant records of plantation serial number.

3.3

When the peanut export enterprises purchase raw material directly or indirectly from the planters, they shall have the raw material provider record material and verify whether the quality safety items come from the plantation place prescribed in 3.2. Before collecting peanut, the relevant authority shall undertake sample upon the relevant raw material and collect the peanut whose quality safety items accord with the requirement of the importers, and make the relevant record of the provider and plantation place for the peanut whose quality safety does not meet the requirement, investigate the reasons and undertake measures to rectify it.

3.4

Peanut export enterprises shall collect the peanut in shell or peanut with well-propositioned moisture, the moisture of peanut in shell shall be less than 10%, that of peanut less than 9%.

3.5

Peanut export enterprises shall undertake batch and mark management upon the purchased raw material and stored by batch, with one batch no more than 100 tons. The serial number of raw batch shall include serial number of the plantation place to avoid mixing them together.

3.6

Peanut export enterprises shall undertake quality control after the raw material enterprise factory. Where the raw material herein does not meet the requirement of the importer and the safety and sanitation requirement, it may not be used for processing export or food raw material, shall be used for other purpose or destroyed after it has been marked, shall be recorded after the reasons have been found.

4.

Shelling control requirement

4.1

The original moisture in the peanut shall be less than 10% and no water shall be added in the process of shelling. Such control measures as removing dust and shell shall be taken and powerful magnet shall be installed at the material exit to remove such metals as nail.

4.2

After shelling, the peanut with its moisture more than 9% shall be ventilated and dried and then stored with clean packs which have sound air permeability and accord with the quality requirement.

4.3

The workshop and machine shall remain clean. The workshop and sheller shall be cleaned on the very day and peanut in shell, peanut or smashed peanut may not be stored in the sheller to prevent mildew and pollution.

5.

Processing control requirement

5.1

Peanut export enterprises shall establish Good Manufacturing Practice(GMP), the workshop sanitary condition hereof shall accord with the Administration of Sanitary Registration of Food Export Enterprise and the peanut export enterprises shall obtain the qualification of sanitary registration.

5.2

Peanuts from the places of different serial number shall be processed respectively and the raw material with strikingly different content of water shall be processed together. In the process of processing, the rotten, moldy, pullulated, covered or worm-eaten peanut shall be thoroughly picked out.

5.3

A powerful magnet shall be installed at the exit of processing material to remove such harmful impurities as magnet metal.

5.4

The processing equipment such as screening machine, peeler and operator's desk shall be cleaned every day, shall be free from the remaining peanut, smashed peanuts to prevent the pollution of mildew and aflatoxin.

6.

Package and mark control requirement

6.1

The peanut export factories shall be inspected and accepted before the entrance of package material to meet the quality control requirement of food package. The provider shall provide quality measurement report of package material.

6.2

The usage of package supplement material such as deoxidant shall accord with the laws of the importer and the People's Republic of China. The producer shall provide the official inspection report

6.3

The enterprise shall strengthen its batch management upon finished products. Every procedure shall record the serial number of material in detail, and batch mark where the batch serial number name and the annual yield are written shall be pasted in the finished package. The batch mark in the finished package shall match with the serial number in the original batch serial number.

6.4

The peanuts exported to European Union shall accord with the requirement of the European Union, as for the indirectly edible or for food raw material the peanuts in shell or peanuts, the destination nation and "peanuts must be subjected to sorting or other physical treatment to reduce aflatoxin contamination before human consumption or use as an ingredient in foodstuffs" shall be noted in every package, and the aforesaid English content shall be noted in the description of the consignment of the issued bill of health.

6.5

The batch number of exported peanuts shall be the serial number of the sanitary registration of processing factory + four digit number(for example, in the batch serial number 3700D132270003, 3700D13227 shall be the sanitary registration number, 0003 shall be batch serial number).

7.

Storage control requirement

7.1

Peanut export enterprises shall establish perfect storage of peanut raw material and storage management of finished product, clarify the operation standard in the storage link, and have the storage in line with their processing capability.

7.2

Raw material and finished products shall be stored in different warehouses and the storage of products shall be neat, separated from wall, ground and roof. The products of different plantation places and batches may not be mixed together.

7.3

The enterprises shall establish the warehouses on par with its production capability, the temperature of the warehouse shall be below 10¡æ and its relative moisture below 70% to prevent the mildew of peanut. The quality of the peanut raw material or finished products during the period of storage shall be regularly inspected. Once having found mildew of peanut, the relevant authority shall take measures to find out the reason and to undertake necessary treatment of the relevant products. Thermometer and hygrometer shall be installed in the warehouse to carry out regularly inspection.

7.4

The ground of the warehouse shall be even, dry, clean; something shall be reasonably put under the pile to prevent the moisture and mildew of products. There shall be such measures as insect, bird, and rat prevention and free from peculiar smells.

8 Control requirement of export shipping

8.1

Peanut export enterprises shall establish loading and transporting operation standard.

8.2

The vehicle shall be checked before being loaded to find whether the vehicle has been polluted or there are sharp projected objects to prevent damaging or polluting the package.

8.3

The airproof and sanitary condition of the box shall be checked before boxing, the box which fails to meet the standard may not be used.

8.4

Weather should be noticed in the time of export shipment, boxing without prevention measures in the raining or snowing weather shall be forbidden to prevent damp.

8.5

When loading the peanut stored in cold warehouse, we shall move them to cool, dry and clean places and reload them when the temperatures in and outside the warehouse are balanced.

8.6

Where it is necessary to load peanut in mixed batch, an explanation shall be given in the loading and transporting record.

8.7

An appropriate amount of cardboards shall be pasted inside the container and an appropriate amount of desiccant be placed in the time of boxing for the ocean transported peanut to prevent the mildew of peanuts against the container. Containers shall be placed below decks or waterline on the occasion of shipping to prevent strong sunlight.

9 To examine the control requirement

9.1

Peanut export enterprises shall establish a lab meeting quality control requirement and compile scientific and standardized lab working manual. The inspection personnel in the lab shall have the degree of technical secondary school (high school) or above and have the relevant professional knowledge, the training by the relevant sectors, have the ability to independently undertake inspection task.

9.2

Peanut export enterprises shall strengthen its self-inspection and self-control. The lab shall be equipped with alflatoxin inspection equipment and the relevant crushing equipments which meet the requirement of the importers in such aspects as moisture and appearance. Other items may carry out self-inspection or entrust the qualified social labs to carry out inspection.

9.3

Enterprises shall, in accordance with the requirement of the importer, carry out sampling and inspection to ensure the representation of the sample of finished products and the preciseness of the inspection results.

9.4

The enterprise lab shall issue the aflatoxin inspection report after having examined the raw material and finished products, whose result shall be numbered and kept in the archive with the original record. The lab inspection record shall be complete, true and traceable, and all the inspection record and inspection report shall be stored for at least two years. The issued finished inspection report shall in duplicate and the original shall be provided to the inspection and quarantine authority as the application for inspection.

9.5

Where the enterprise finds that the quality safety item does not meet the standard in the time of self-inspection, entrusted-inspection or sampling by the inspection and quarantine authority, it shall certificate batch of the excess of standard and trace to the original plantation place in accordance with the serial number, investigate the situation, analyze reasons and take measures to rectify it and make record properly.

9.6

Peanut export enterprises shall strengthen its management upon the lab, strengthen its training upon the technical personnel, check the apparatus and equipment regularly to ensure the preciseness and liability of the inspection result, and take measures appropriately to rectify problems.

9.7

The local inspection and quarantine authorities shall strengthen its technical guide, supervision and administration upon the enterprise lab, carry out a contrast experiment annually to ensure the preciseness and liability of the inspection result.

10 Treatment of the reject

10.1

Where the processing enterprise find that the aflatoxin exceeds the requirement of the importer in the time of purchasing raw material, the processing enterprise may refuse to accept it or change the measure s of the importer and store the raw material independently after having marked it. The processing materials herein shall record the treatment process properly for trace management purpose.

10.2

The processing enterprises shall independently store and mark such products as the reject, scrap, and the products which the content of excessive pesticide remnant, heavy metal and aflatoxin exceed the limit requirement of the importer. Such measures as reprocessing, changing usage and the treatment measures of importer shall be taken for the aforesaid rejects. The treatment process shall be recorded promptly for the purpose of traceability management.

10.3

Where such safety sanitary items as aflatoxin, pesticide remnant, heavy metal in the exported peanut does not meet the relevant standards, the enterprise shall trace all the links such as peanut plantation, shelling, purchase, processing, storage, and transport, and takes the measures of changing the importer or usage, and report the treatment records to the inspection and quarantine authority for archive.

10.4

Where it is found by the foreign inspection authority that the exported does not meet the safety sanitary item such as aflatoxin, pesticide remnant, heavy metal, the enterprise shall trace all the links such as peanut plantation, shelling, purchase, processing, storage, export and transport, find out the reason and report it in written form to the inspection and quarantine authority. Where this batch of peanut has been returned, the inspection and quarantine authority shall take samples for inspection; the enterprise may take such measures as changing its usage and report the treatment record to the inspection and quarantine authority for archive.