Bags of trouble

Nothing seems to loom larger in this country than food safety, with hazardous foods being revealed one after another.

The latest to join the list is Yantai apples, which are wrapped with paper bags containing the chemicals tuzet and asomate during their growth. This has caused concern for their safety, although further tests are needed to ascertain the degree of risk people may face in eating such apples.

Paper bags were first introduced to prevent apples from being contaminated when pesticides were sprayed on the trees, a practice that is done more than a dozen times a year. But in recent years bag dealers have started to promote bags impregnated with pesticides and chemicals, claiming that such bags make the apples look nicer and easier to keep. The bags are produced by small workshops.