'China's Bordeaux' in chemical scandal

CHINA’S FLEDGLING wine-growing business has been hit by the latest food scandal to shake the country after a number of wineries were shut and six people were arrested for adding banned chemicals to wine in “China’s Bordeaux”.

The adulteration took place in Changli county in Hebei province, which produces around one third of China’s wine, and is the latest food safety scare to rattle consumer confidence in a country still affected by a 2008 scandal of deadly tainted milk.

State broadcaster CCTV revealed that vineyards in the region were mixing the wine with sugar water, colouring agents and artificial flavourings, and then falsely using famous brand names such as “Great Wall” – one of the most popular domestic brands.

The Global Timesnewspaper quoted a leading industry expert, Huang Weidong, as saying the additives could cause cardiac irregularities and headaches, and were possibly carcinogenic.

Meanwhile, Zhang Tao, a spokesman for the Wal-Mart chain of shops in Beijing, said: “We are highly concerned about this behaviour. To ensure safety measures, we have already started to remove the suspected wines from the shelves.”

Some 30 wineries have been shuttered and accounts worth €325,000 frozen. Over 5,000 cases of wine have been seized, but it was not clear how much of the tainted wine was already on supermarket shelves.

Very few Chinese wines come close to world quality standards and the vast majority of wine in China is nowhere near good enough to be considered alongside even the vins de table of France or Australia.

However, domestic wines have developed a cachet among local consumers.

The timing of this matter is poor, as it comes one month ahead of Chinese wine’s busiest season – the lunar new year.

In a scandal in 2008, at least six children died and around 300,000 fell sick after consuming powdered milk laced with the industrial chemical melamine, which was added to make products appear higher in protein.

The Global Timesquoted villagers in the Changli area saying locals were worried that their income from wine production could evaporate because of the scandal.

“We don’t know how to survive in the future. What if most of the wineries are shut down and no one buys our grapes? Over 80 per cent of our lands are used to grow grapes,” said one villager, surnamed Zhang.