Strengthened food, drug testing urged to address outstanding issues

A leading official from China's food and drug watchdog has called for enhanced testing to tackle outstanding issues in the country's food and drug sector.

Sun Xianze, a member of the Communist Party of China group of the China Food and Drug Administration, has urged food and drug regulators to avoid and resolve risks by relying on science and technology and enhance their testing capabilities, according to a statement posted on the administration's website on Tuesday.

Overall, the country's food and drug sector features steady growth, but outstanding problems such as unbalanced development in the food industry and high-tech counterfeiting in the pharmaceutical field remain, the statement quoted Sun as saying at a recent symposium.

To address these problems, a food and drug testing system incorporating governmental testing agencies at the national and local levels, as well as third-party testing organizations, should be established, Sun said.