Severer penalties can deter food offenders

The uncovering of a big network involving 11 groups suspected of selling contaminated pork in 11 provinces and autonomous regions is a great job by the police in these localities. Yet people will hardly feel optimistic about food safety once they consider how such pork could easily pass through all the defense lines that should have prevented it from entering the market and ending up on the dining tables of many.

Insurance agents who pay pig farms for the loss of their animals due to disease know that it is not only unethical but also a crime to provide information about dead pigs to those who profiteer from the pork of such pigs. But they did it simply because they were paid.

The pig farmers should also have known that pigs that died from disease should be disposed of in a safe manner without letting them get in people's harm's way. But they sold them even though insurance companies have already paid them for the loss they suffered. They too did it for money.