Violations at drinking water production facility in Nghe An: Many product quality indicators are announced 'for show'
(Baonghean.vn) - On the labels of many types of drinking water, there are indicators with low content, showing good product quality, but when the inspection team asked for evidence, no facility could provide it.
Nghe An: 'Roll call' of 15 drinking water production facilities violating quality and industrial property
(Baonghean.vn) - 13/26 facilities sampled in this inspection violated quality standards (accounting for 50%) - an alarming number - Nghe An Province Department of Science and Technology warned.
Regarding the information that 15 bottled water production facilities violated quality and industrial property standards discovered by the Department of Science and Technology's inspection team, many facilities announced quality standards "for show".
Mr. Nguyen Manh Ha - Chief Inspector of the Department of Science and Technology said that although the products of all establishments have been fully labeled according to regulations, information on product quality indicators of some establishments is problematic.
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| Workers do not wear protective clothing during production. Photo: Manh Ha |
The label shows indicators with contents such as Nitrite, Copper, Arsenic, Lead, Manganese, Mercury, Nickel, and Stibi that are many times lower than the allowable levels of QCVN 6-1/2010/BYT (showing that the product quality is better than the regulations of the standard), even lower than the detection limit of the testing room.
When the inspection team asked the production facilities to provide evidence to prove the above announced standards, none of them could provide it. The owners of these facilities explained that the reason for announcing standards that did not exist, or were lower/higher than QCVN 6-1/2010/BYT was due to lack of professional knowledge, depending on the advice of others, and not based on quality testing as evidence.
“This shows that many bottled water production facilities do not fully understand the regulations of QCVN 6-1/2010/BYT in general and the quality of the products they produce in particular. While this is also a type of pre-packaged product, consumers cannot monitor the quality, but depend entirely on the production facilities,” said Mr. Ha.
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| The process of rinsing the bottle is still sketchy and unhygienic. Photo: Manh Ha |
Currently, there are 107 establishments producing bottled drinking water and bottled natural mineral water in the province. Most of the inspected establishments have small production and business scale of one to two employees. In terms of administrative procedures, the establishments meet the regulations to produce and trade bottled drinking water.
However, according to the inspection team, through observation, some facilities have product bottling areas that are not clean and separate, reusable containers are not thoroughly washed before bottling, there is no area to change protective clothing, and workers do not wear protective clothing during the production process.
According to Mr. Ha, the delegation's work plan mentioned the inspection of 6 establishments producing and trading domestic water in the province. However, according to the Nghe An Health Inspection Work Plan in 2019, the Health Department Inspectorate will conduct specialized inspections of 11 establishments supplying domestic water in the fourth quarter of 2019. To avoid overlap in inspection activities, the inspection delegation will not conduct inspections of establishments producing and trading domestic water.
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| List of 15 bottled water production facilities violating quality and industrial property. Photo: PB |
As reported by Nghe An Newspaper, the inspection team of the Department of Science and Technology of the province collected 26 samples of bottled drinking water to test the quality according to the National Technical Regulation for natural mineral water and bottled drinking water QCVN 6-1:2010/BYT.
All of the above samples were sent for testing at the National Institute for Food Safety Control. As a result, 13/26 bottled water samples did not meet quality standards. The unsatisfactory indicators were microbiological indicators such as: E.coli, Coliform, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and sulfite-reducing anaerobic bacterial spores. Thereby, there is a basis to affirm that the cause of the violation comes from the bottling and bottling process that does not ensure hygiene according to regulations.
According to Mr. Nguyen Manh Ha - Chief Inspector of the Department of Science and Technology, Head of the inspection team, 13/26 facilities sampled in this inspection violated quality (accounting for 50%), which is an alarming number.
In addition to the 26 establishments inspected by the Department of Science and Technology, the district-level People's Committee delegations collected 61 samples of bottled drinking water and bottled natural mineral water. The Department's inspectors transferred all of these samples to the National Institute for Food Safety Control (a designated testing laboratory of the Ministry of Health) for quality testing.
The results showed that 23/61 samples violated quality. Currently, the inspection teams of the district People's Committee are in the process of handling the violations.
Previously, in 2015, the Department of Science and Technology inspected 41 establishments producing and trading bottled drinking water, and discovered and handled 21 establishments violating quality regulations.
