"FOOD 2020: THE FUTURE OF FOOD, NUTRITION & WELLNESSViewpoints
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China: Melamine Crisis Hastened Consumers’ 2020 Demands |
Since the Food 2020 survey was completed in China, the country has been struck by the most impactful food-safety crisis in recent history: the melamine contamination across the dairy and then the broader food industry.
The survey findings still remain relevant but we can assume that, were the questions to be asked again, the results would differ in some ways today.
As the survey found, the Chinese people closely associate food with health. This is based upon a deep cultural understanding of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) philosophies. TCM is still the preferred form of medicine for most Chinese people. Chinese people also believe more so than in other countries that food is essential to survival, mainly due to a more recent history of widespread extreme poverty and hunger. This view has diminished since the late 1970s, but it is still a subconscious consideration even for the more affluent, urban-living Chinese consumer.
These cultural beliefs and habits around food mean that illegal practices and deliberate contamination (such as in the melamine crisis and many more before) during manufacturing are particularly painful for the Chinese consumer. So while our survey respondents expressed higher expectations of best practices and transparency from food companies and called for more consumer control over food ingredients and manufacturing practices by the year 2020, the melamine crisis has led to many of these demands being met ahead of time.
The government has shown unprecedented transparency in its reaction to the first stages of the crisis and, as it unfolded, publicly admitted that the melamine issue undoubtedly ran deep through the domestic food industry. Key government department leaders have resigned and harsh punishments have been promised to those responsible. The government inspection department has tripled its work force and is completing additional checks across all stages of the food manufacturing process from animal feed to packaging, so the industry will be feeling the pressure to prevent another “melamine” at all costs.
Local and international food companies in China have different challenges in this climate. First, Chinese companies communicating with Chinese consumers need to eliminate unsafe manufacturing practices throughout their supply chains. Successful local food brands will communicate their safety credentials (with the proactive offering of information and data), nutritional value and simple ingredients.
International brands need to be "clean," too. The government inspection of foreign food imports has always been stringent, and it is even more so now. To take the heat away from local companies after the melamine contamination, any instance of a shipment being turned away from China for any reason makes headlines. And while imported food from the U.S. and Europe is understood to be of a high quality, to really compete against local brands, foreign food companies will need to bring down prices to chip away at the assumption that imported food is expensive.
