Arsenic fish sauce case: VASEP and 4 fish sauce associations jointly petition the Prime Minister

On October 21, the Fish Sauce Associations sent a petition to the Prime Minister and the Ministries of Health, Agriculture and Rural Development, Industry and Trade, and Public Security.

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This document is jointly submitted by the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP) and the Nha Trang, Phan Thiet - Binh Thuan, Phu Quoc Fish Sauce Associations and the Ho Chi Minh City Food and Foodstuff Association.

Accordingly, the associations said fish sauce is a traditional product, the national spirit of Vietnam, closely associated with the lives of Vietnamese people, and has been widely consumed for hundreds of years.

“Every year, Vietnamese consumers consume about 200 million liters of fish sauce, of which 50 million liters are pure fish sauce (traditional fish sauce). Since integrating into the world economy, some traditional fish sauce brands have been exported to many countries,” the Association’s petition stated.

However, on October 17, 2016, the Vietnam Standards and Consumers Association (Vinastas) issued a press release announcing the results of testing 150 fish sauce samples, including the following paragraph:

“In particular, up to 101 (67.33%) fish sauce samples did not meet the Arsenic (arsenic) standard - an extremely toxic metalloid. According to the regulations in the Technical Standards on Heavy Metals (QCVN 8-2:2011/BYT), the maximum allowable Arsenic content in fish sauce products is 1.0 mg/liter, but the test results showed that the total Arsenic content in the samples did not meet the standard, ranging from 1-5 mg/liter. Notably, the higher the protein content of the samples, the higher the percentage of samples with total Arsenic content exceeding the prescribed threshold (95.65% of the surveyed samples with a concentration of 40 degrees or higher had an Arsenic content exceeding the prescribed threshold)”.

According to the petition sent by the associations to the Prime Minister, “Vinastas’ announcement has caused confusion between organic arsenic, which is always present in marine fish and is non-toxic, and inorganic arsenic, which is very toxic. The content of the announcement is not only inconsistent with international standards on arsenic concentration in food in general and in fish sauce in particular, but also inconsistent with QCVN 8-2:2011/BYT, in which the arsenic content, understood as inorganic, in fish sauce is 1 mg/l”.

Therefore, the assertion that the higher the protein content of fish sauce, the higher the arsenic contamination rate has had a direct impact, with quite serious consequences, on the traditional fish sauce production industry of Vietnam. If not handled promptly, it will certainly have a significant impact on the marine fishing industry.

The general statement that arsenic is extremely toxic has caused extreme confusion among consumers. There are many signs that consumers are rejecting traditional fish sauce. Some supermarkets and retail stores have announced a temporary suspension of purchasing from traditional fish sauce manufacturers.

Although Vinastas did not publicly disclose the list of fish sauce brands containing arsenic residue, the following day the list was widely circulated on social networks.

“There is a phenomenon that this list is distributed directly to consumers at traditional markets and retail stores by employees of some industrial fish sauce manufacturers. The advertising content of industrial fish sauce manufacturers appearing in some newspapers does not comply with the regulations on Arsenic in QCVN 8-2:2011/BYT,” the Associations pointed out.

Faced with that situation, on October 20, 2016, under the chairmanship of VASEP, traditional fish sauce production associations including Phu Quoc Fish Sauce Association, Phan Thiet-Binh Thuan Fish Sauce Association, Nha Trang Fish Sauce Association, Ho Chi Minh City Food and Foodstuff Association and a number of fish sauce enterprises representing the North met to assess the damage to the traditional fish sauce production industry of Vietnam and agree on solutions to protect and develop traditional fish sauce. The leaders of the 5 Associations participating in the meeting agreed to make a recommendation to the Prime Minister, including

Check and evaluate the level of damage caused by Vinastas' press release dated October 16, 2016 to the traditional fish sauce production industry and warn to prevent similar cases from happening again.

Inspect and strictly punish the act of illegally disseminating the list of fish sauce brands with arsenic content, which is actually not harmful according to the Regulations in the "National technical regulation on heavy metal contamination limits in food of the Ministry of Health" QCVN 8-2:2011/BYT", but causes confusion for consumers, seriously harms the reputation of traditional fish sauce, and strictly handle acts of incorrect advertising.

Publicly announce on mass media that organic arsenic present in fish sauce is not harmful to consumers' health and clarify the limit of arsenic contamination in fish sauce in the Technical Standard on Heavy Metals QCVN 8-2:2011 as inorganic arsenic.

In addition, the technical regulations on fish sauce have been drafted by the Ministry of Health since 2012, including many regulations on chemical additives that are not suitable for traditional fish sauce, and have not been issued yet. The Associations propose that the Prime Minister transfer the drafting and issuance of the Technical Regulations for fish sauce to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to suit the expertise and at the same time promote the rapid issuance of these technical regulations.

According to Cafef/Trithuctre