Consumer protection body apologises over fish sauce misinformation

Vinastas, a consumer protection agency, has apologised for its false conclusion that the majority of fish sauce samples it tested contained toxic levels of a chemical substance known as arsenic.

The body reported last month that two thirds of the 150 commercially available samples it had collected had arsenic content exceeding the safe limit, but no arsenic in its inorganic form was found.

The ambiguity caused panic among consumers and damaged fish sauce producers.

Highly toxic inorganic arsenic is naturally present in groundwater, but in seafood arsenic is mainly found in its less toxic organic form, according to the World Health Organisation.

The organisation adds that organic arsenic compounds are rapidly eliminated by the body.

Following Vinastas’s statement, Vietnam’s Ministry of Health assembled a team to test 247 randomly selected samples from 210 brands produced by 82 fish sauce manufacturers both by traditional and industrial methods.

It found that none of the nearly 250 samples taken for testing contained inorganic arsenic or other heavy metals such as lead, mercury and cadmium.

Vinastas was accused of misleading the public by only using the generic term “arsenic” in its survey results and failing to distinguish between the two forms of arsenic.

The agency was later found by the Ministry of Industry and Trade to have lacked independence, reliability and transparency in conducting its fish sauce survey, which was funded by an external organisation.

Vinastas’ equating of toxic inorganic arsenic with the harmless organic form was quickly copied by many newspapers, causing panic among consumers and damaging fish sauce producers, as sales were temporarily halted at many supermarkets.

Last week such media agencies were fined by the Ministry of Information and Communications for carrying the false information, with the heaviest penalty of VND200 million imposed on Thanh Nien.

The paper carried out its own survey and reported the results in a similarly ambiguous way in a series of its articles, which were later removed from its website.

(Source: NDO)