Breaking News : Six more detained over melamine in China??

Testing for melamine and cyanuric acid in food

Until the 2007 pet food recalls, melamine had not routinely been monitored in food, except in the context of plastic safety or insecticide residue. This could be due to the previously assumed low toxicity of melamine, and the relatively expensive methods of detection.

Because melamine resin is often used in food packaging and tableware, melamine at ppm level (1 part per million) in food and beverage has been reported due to migration from melamine-containing resins.Small amounts of melamine have also been reported in foodstuff as a metabolite product of cyromazine, an insecticide used on animals and crops.

The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) provides a test method for analyzing cyromazine and melamine in animal tissues. In 2007, the FDA began using a high performance liquid chromatography test to determine the melamine, ammeline, ammelide, and cyanuric acid contamination in food.Another procedure is based on surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS).

Breaking News : Six more detained over melamine in China??

Police have detained six more people in the country's contaminated milk scandal amid increasing efforts to restore public trust in domestic dairy products.

The suspects were caught in Hohhot in the country's main dairy-producing area of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region after allegedly selling and mixing the industrial chemical melamine into raw milk, the city government said in a notice on its website Monday.

The detentions were made during an investigation into melamine contamination at Yili and Mengniu, two top-selling dairy companies based in the region, the notice said.

Powdered and liquid milk from the two companies were earlier found tainted with melamine, a chemical often used in plastic but banned by the food industry.

Making milk products seem high in protein during quality tests, it can cause kidney problems if consumed.

Melamine has been blamed for killing four babies and sickening more than 50,000 others.

The latest move in Hohhot follows the detention last week of 22 people in Hebei province suspected of involvement in a network producing melamine and selling it on to milk farms and collecting stations.

No charges have been lodged yet. Meanwhile, the country is struggling to restore public confidence in domestic dairy products by intensifying quality checks.

More than 5,000 inspectors have been posted at the country's dairy factories for round-the-clock inspections, Wang Yong, the new director of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ), said on Sunday.

"Every batch of products must receive testing before leaving the factory," he said. Wang's predecessor Li Changjiang resigned soon after the dairy contamination scandal broke out on Sept 11.

The AQSIQ also said on Sunday no melamine was found in the latest tests of milk produced after Sept 14.

It said no problems were detected with products from top-selling brands such as Yili, Mengniu and Bright Dairy, whose goods were found contaminated with melamine in previous checks.

Individuals who have doubts over the dairy products they consume could also access testing at authorized centers starting from Monday, the first working day after the week-long National Day holiday.

The AQSIQ announced 45 authorized testing centers across the country for melamine testing on Sunday.

Last Thursday, 388 centers received authorization, according to a notice on the AQSIQ website.

A receptionist at the testing center of the Chinese Academy of Inspection and Quarantine, one of the authorized centers in Beijing, told China Daily the center had already fielded some individual testing requests but would not give specific numbers.

The receptionist, surnamed Zhang, said fees for melamine testing range from 600 to 1,000 yuan ($88-146), with results available within 10 days.

She said the tests require a minimum of 200 g of powdered milk or two bags of liquid milk, preferably in unopened packages.

Breaking News: China milk crisis to cost billions??

Breaking News: China milk crisis to cost billions??
China's milk crisis will likely cost billions of dollars, disrupt millions of livelihoods, and it could be a year before consumer confidence in dairy companies is restored, experts say.

Chinese officials are anxious to draw a line under the scandal that killed four infants and sickened more than 53,000 children after melamine, a chemical used to make plastic, was found in milk from leading dairies.

State media trumpeted on the weekend that samples from 31 brands of baby formula contained no trace of the chemical. Similarly, samples from hundreds of batches of liquid and powdered milk were also melamine-free.

In Shanghai, hip hop music blasted from a stage next to a giant inflatable cow as Guangming Bright Dairy -- one of more than 20 companies whose milk was tainted with melamine -- tried to woo back milk drinkers.

In southern Shenzhen, dairy firms Mengniu and Yili offered competing "buy one, get one free" promotions on crates of milk.

But despite the fanfare, consumers are likely to remain cautious and a number of countries around the world have banned or restricted imports of Chinese milk products.

"What you see in China with the melamine crisis right now is so widely spread that there is clearly a gap in the quality control system," said Bram Wouters, who is leading a project at Wageningen University in the Netherlands to help China improve milk quality.

"For sure that gap will be closed," he said by telephone. "But there is no guarantee consumers' confidence will return quickly."

It could take up to a year to repair the public's damaged faith, experts agreed.

In the meantime, the economic costs are mounting.

No official estimate has been released of how much the crisis cost China's dairy industry.

Companies whose products were contaminated saw sales plunge 60 to 70 percent last month from a year earlier, said Lao Bing, an analyst with Shanghai-based Mental Marketing Dairy Consulting.

Dairy sales for the full year are likely to be 20 percent lower than the 160 billion yuan (23.5 billion dollars) posted last year, said Bao, whose firm advises leading Chinese dairy brands.

"The industry had been growing at a pace of more than 20 percent over the past few years, but this year it's going to remain flat," he said.

About three million workers, mostly connected to the small dairy producers who account for 80 percent of China's milk production were affected, said Chen Lianfang, an analyst from Beijing-based Orient Agribusiness Consultant.

In parts of northern China's milk producing heartland, farmers were having to pour away milk at the peak of the crisis because no one would buy it, state media reported.

It is in these areas that experts believe the melamine may have been added to deliberately watered-down milk to make it seem richer in protein.

In the northern province of Hebei, one of the centres of the crisis, authorities have agreed to pay farmers 200 yuan for each cow as a subsidy to keep them in business.

But to restore confidence, authorities should work with these small producers to continue to improve hygiene, educate them and give them incentives to deliver quality instead of quantity, Wouters said.

"Let consumers know there is quality control exercised at all stages in the chain not only at the dairy plants and in the supermarkets but also at the producers' site because there the main problem for sure is at the farm level," said Wouters who was researching in northeastern Heilongjiang province last month before the scandal broke.

He estimated it could take anywhere from weeks to a year to establish quality control along the chain linking farmers to consumers.

"In China things can move fairly fast, it could be that quality control on this issue is exercised fairly quickly and put in place. It has a lot of attention at the moment," he said.

Breaking News: China milk crisis to cost billions??

Breaking News : Melamine founded in pet food??

Breaking News : Melamine founded in pet food??
A nitrogen-rich chemical used to make plastic and sometimes as a fertilizer may have been deliberately added to an ingredient in pet food that has sickened and killed cats and dogs across the country, public and private officials say. A leading theory is that it was added to fake higher protein levels.

Melamine has been found in wheat gluten, rice protein concentrate and, in South Africa, corn gluten, all imported from China, and all meant for use in pet food, the Food and Drug Administration confirmed Thursday.

"It adds to the theory when you see other products that are labeled as protein supplements, in this case rice protein, and in South Africa corn gluten and in the previous case wheat gluten," said Stephen Sundlof, FDA chief veterinarian. "That melamine was found in all three of those, it would certainly lend credibility to the theory that this was intentional."

How the melamine got there is "not something we're going to be able to determine until we actually investigate the plants in China," he said.

The FDA has not yet been able to get letters of invitation from the Chinese government that would allow its inspectors to enter the country, he said.

ChemNutra, which imported the wheat gluten linked to last month's massive pet-food recall, says it is concerned its Chinese supplier spiked the product.

In a letter on ChemNutra's website, Chief Executive Steve Miller said, "We are concerned that we may have been the victim of deliberate and mercenary contamination for the purpose of making the wheat gluten we purchased appear to have a higher protein content than it did."

Melamine is "simply not a chemical even on the radar screen for food ingredient suppliers," he wrote.

But it does have a lot of nitrogen in it, says Ron Madl, director of Kansas State University's Bioprocessing and Industrial Value Added program. The most common way to test protein levels in the grain industry is to test for nitrogen, a major component of protein.

Adding melamine, with its high amount of nitrogen, to wheat gluten would give the illusion of a higher protein content, Madl said.

On Wednesday, San Francisco-based Wilbur-Ellis recalled all of its rice protein concentrate, imported from China, after FDA tests found melamine in it.

The Blue Buffalo Co. on Thursday recalled some of its Spa Select Kitten dry food because it contained rice protein concentrate from Wilbur-Ellis.

Wilbur-Ellis says five pet-food makers got the concentrate. More recalls are possible, the FDA said Thursday. Natural Balance Pet Foods said it had found melamine in two of its venison-based products, and so it did a recall. Its food was made by Diamond Pet Foods, which got the concentrate from Wilbur-Ellis.

The FDA said Thursday it is inspecting all incoming shipments of rice protein concentrate and wheat gluten from China.

Press reports out of South Africa say tests have confirmed that some Royal Canin pet food made there contained corn gluten imported from China that had melamine in it.

Sundlof said the FDA has no information that any of that corn gluten went to U.S. pet-food makers.

Breaking News : 980 products in Malaysia tested safe

KUALA LUMPUR: A total of 980 products manufactured by 34 companies have been verified as safe from melamine contamination.

The Health Ministry said yesterday the products included milk and milk products manufactured by Mead Johnson, Dumex, Nestle Manufacturing (M) Sdn Bhd, Fonterra Brands' (M) Sdn Bhd, Mamee Food Factory, Dutch Lady, Ace Canning Corporation, Maestro Swiss Food Sdn Bhd, Wyeth Malaysia, Malaysian Milk Sdn Bhd/Contra Enterprise, Glaxosmithkline, Abbott Laboratories, Yakult, Unilever, Snow Marketing Sdn Bhd and Novalac (M) Sdn Bhd.

The others are Blue Oasis (M) Sdn Bhd, Morinaga Milk Industry Co Ltd, Orient Europharma (M) Sdn Bhd, Cadbury Malaysia, Beryl's Chocolate and Confectionery Sdn Bhd, F&N Dairies (M) Sdn Bhd, AB Food & Beverages (Thailand) Ltd, F&N United Ltd, Thailand, Campbell Cheong Chan Sdn Bhd, Raviraj Sdn Bhd, Magic Food Sdn Bhd, Bun Guan Brothers Sdn Bhd, King's Creammaries Sdn Bhd, Country Farms Sdn Bhd, Esthetics International Group Bhd, Etika Dairies Sdn Bhd, Sejahtera United Sdn Bhd and Tesco Stores (M) Sdn Bhd.

Apart from verification from the industry that the milk ingredients were not sourced from China, cereals, confectionaries, chocolates, milk and milk products produced by these companies were also tested by the Chemistry Department.

Some 540 seizures on products worth RM92,366 were carried out on suspected melamine-contaminated food products.
Sixteen samples that were found to be melamine-free are: Passion's Chocolate coated Wafer, Kraft's Oreo White Chocolate Wafer Stick, Wall's Mini Cornetto (chocomint and tiramisu flavoured), Wall's Moo Soft Cookie Sandwich, Dutch Lady 123 Honey, Frisolac infant formula, Wall's Mini Poppers (vanilla and strawberry flavoured), Nestle's Honey Stars, Nestle's Drumstick Mini (chocolate and vanilla flavoured), Wall's Soft Cookies Sandwich, Take One's Baby Bites and Baby Bites Carrot, King's Frutto's ice confection yogurt with peach, raisins and pineapple.

Breaking News : 2 Cadbury products contains Melamine in Hong Kong??

Breaking News : 2 Cadbury products contains Melamine in Hong Kong??

Melamine is combined with formaldehyde to produce melamine resin, a very durable thermosetting plastic, and melamine foam, a polymeric cleaning product. The end products include countertops, dry erase boards, fabrics, glues, housewares and flame retardants. Melamine is one of the major components in Pigment Yellow 150, a colorant in inks and plastics.

Melamine also enters the fabrication of melamine poly-sulfonate used as superplasticizer for making high-resistance concrete. Sulfonated melamine formaldehyde (SMF) is a polymer used as cement admixture to reduce the water content in concrete while increasing the fluidity and the workability of the mix during its handling and pouring. It results in concrete with a lower porosity and a higher mechanical strength exhibiting an improved resistance to aggressive environments and a longer life-time.

The use of melamine as fertilizer for crops had been envisaged during the '50s and '60s because of its high nitrogen content (2/3). However, the hydrolysis reactions of melamine leading to the nitrogen mineralisation in soils are very slow, precluding a broad use of melamine as fertilizing agent.

Melamine derivatives of arsenical drugs are potentially important in the treatment of African trypanosomiasis

Melamine use as non-protein nitrogen (NPN) for cattle was described in a 1958 patent.In 1978, however, a study concluded that melamine "may not be an acceptable non-protein N source for ruminants" because its hydrolysis in cattle is slower and less complete than other nitrogen sources such as cottonseed meal and urea.

Melamine is sometimes illegally added to food products in order to increase the apparent protein content. Standard tests such as the Kjeldahl and Dumas tests estimate protein levels by measuring the nitrogen content, so they can be misled by adding nitrogen-rich compounds such as melamine.

Hong Kong finds melamine in two Cadbury products

HONG KONG, Oct 6 (Reuters) - A Hong Kong laboratory has found excessive amounts of the industrial chemical melamine in two types of Cadbury Plc chocolate made in China that the firm recalled last week as a precaution.

Thousands of children in China have fallen sick and four have died after drinking melamine-laced milk. The dairy scare, China's latest in a long line of food safety problems, also prompted mounting recalls and warnings abroad.

Cadbury Dairy Milk Cookies Chocolate Bulk Pack 5kg was found to contain with 6.9 parts per million (ppm) of melamine and Cadbury Dairy Milk Hazelnut Chocolate Bulk Pack 5 kg had 56 ppm, a government statement said.

Under Hong Kong regulations, the limit for melamine in these products is 2.5 ppm.

"Based on the levels detected, the public is advised to stop consuming the products concerned," a spokesman for Hong Kong's Centre for Food Safety said.

The British confectionary group last Monday announced the recall of 11 Chinese-made products from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Australia as the scandal snowballed.

Tests in Hong Kong cleared another of the recalled products, which was not named in the government statement, bringing to six the number of Cadbury products with satisfactory levels of melamine so far.

Three products were not available for tests, the Hong Kong government statement said.

Chinese police have detained six people suspected of producing and selling melamine, the official Xinhua news agency said. (Reporting by John Ruwitch; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Breaking news: Melamine hits world??

Melamine is an organic base and a trimer of cyanamide, with a 1,3,5-triazine skeleton. Like cyanamide, it contains 66% nitrogen by mass and, if mixed with resins, has fire retardant properties due to its release of nitrogen gas when burned or charred, and has several other industrial uses. Melamine is also a metabolite of cyromazine, a pesticide. It is formed in the body of mammals who have ingested cyromazine.It has been reported that cyromazine can also be converted to melamine in plants.

Melamine combines with cyanuric acid to form melamine cyanurate, which has been implicated in the Chinese protein export contaminations.

(Credited to Wikipedia)

What is Melamine?

Melamine is an organic compound that is often combined with formaldehyde to produce melamine resin, a synthetic polymer which is fire resistant and heat tolerant. Melamine resin is a very versatile material with a highly stable structure. Uses for melamine include whiteboards, floor tiles, kitchenware, fire retardant fabrics, and commercial filters. Melamine can be easily molded while warm, but will set into a fixed form. This property makes it ideally suited to certain industrial applications.

Melamine resin is manufactured by mixing urea with formaldehyde under heat and pressure. The substances begin to polymerize and are forced into a mold which will create the desired shape. Under pressure, melamine releases water, which could make the plastic unstable if it is not removed. The materials finish polymerizing and create a finished product, melamine resin.

Melamine resin is known as a thermoset plastic, because the plastic is fixed after molding. If exposed to enough heat, melamine will melt. For this reason, melamine dishware should not be exposed to high temperatures like those in the oven and microwave. However, the plastic is able to withstand higher temperatures than other plastics. Because it is a thermoset plastic, melamine resin is difficult to recycle.

Melamine can be made into a foam product. Melamine foam has a distinctive structure composed of stacked bubble shapes, which are extremely hard and therefore can easily clean a wide variety of substances. Melamine foam is marketed under a variety of commercial names including Magic Eraser, a cleaning tool well known for removing scuffs and dirt from a wide range of surfaces.

Melamine resin is used in Formica and similar construction products made from composite materials. Formica is made using melamine resin, which is used to coat the fibers in the upper layer of the construction product. The melamine resin makes the end result heat resistant, so that hot objects can be set on the counter without concern. The surface of the material is designed to be easily wiped and cleaned, creating a long lived household product.

Melamine also plays a role in a wide range of flame resistant materials. These include textiles used in upholstery and the uniforms worn by firemen. Thermal liners, heat resistant gloves, and aprons to protect from splashback of hot substances are made using melamine. Melamine will protect a wearer from heat hazards, and will help to resist the spread of fire in aircraft and buses by providing a fire blocker.

Melamine is also used in the manufacture of some filters. The material is porous and will admit substances to pass through, but can be used to filter out particles of a particular size. Melamine filters are capable of handling a high capacity and can be used in hot environments due to the heat resistance of melamine. Melamine filters are also extremely efficient.

Aside from common commercial uses, melamine became a topic of much discussion in early 2007, when veterinary scientists determined it to be the cause of hundreds of pet deaths, because of pet food contamination. Prior to these reports, melamine had been regarded as non-toxic or minimally toxic. However, because of the unexplained presence of melamine in wheat gluten added to mass-produced dog and cat foods, it is the most likely cause. Pet owners report symptoms that are commonly associated with renal failure, which could be explained by the ammonia that may result from the digestion of the melamine.