Taiwan's minister to answer questions about the wastage of US$6.25M of imported eggs
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09/19/2023 12:06 AM


Taipei, Sept. 18 (CNA) Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) on Monday said he will ask Agriculture Minister Chen Chih-chung (陳吉仲) to publicly address concerns about a special egg import program his ministry launched amid a national egg shortage earlier this year.

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The controversy relates to a program under which the government imported 145 million eggs from Brazil and six other countries between March and July to address a domestic shortage that Taiwan faced earlier this year.

Of the imports, 54 million eggs, or 37 percent of the total, with a value of over NT$200 million (US$6.25 million), have been sent to be destroyed, mostly because they expired in storage facilities after domestic production began to rebound

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Aside from the issue of financial waste, the government has also been criticized for being slow to provide information on the whereabouts of the imported eggs, thus failing to assuage fears among the public that the expired or substandard eggs might have hit the market.

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One of the criticisms relates to a batch of 20,000 imported eggs that was recalled from the PX Mart supermarket chain last week after their expiration date was incorrectly labeled as Oct. 5, rather than dates from Sept. 24-27.

It remains unclear whether Tai Nong Egg Products Co., the company that washed and labeled the eggs, was responsible for the labeling error, or if -- as its chairman has claimed -- it did not receive proper instructions from the Agriculture Ministry.

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Suspicions have also been raised as to why Ultra Source Ltd. (超思公司), a small company with only NT$500,000 in authorized capital, was contracted by the government to import 88 million eggs under the program.


https://focustaiwan.tw/politics/202309190001
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