Officials ignored banned lean meat drug use

A jail term of seven years has been imposed on a former husbandry official in central China's Henan Province for dereliction of duty and embezzlement.

The former department chief of the Jiaxian County agriculture and husbandry bureau, Liu Jinchun, was convicted of forging test reports and siphoning off 70,000 yuan (US$11,109) from subsidies to raisers, the Jiaxian County People's Court said.

From Shanghaidaily.com:

Liu asked raisers to prepare clean pig urine samples ahead of checks by provincial authorities. He also issued quality passes to raisers without supervision, yesterday's Legal Daily reported.

Officials told the court that Liu's department would test pig urine samples before the checks to ensure they were clean. "We sealed the samples in the fridges and heated them when provincial investigators came," they said.

Despite the fact that Henan had repeatedly ordered local authorities to strictly monitor banned chemicals in pig feed, there wasn't a quality investigation department in the Jiaxian bureau, Liu said.

"The records of the daily feeds and drugs are incomplete and bogus. We never checked the raisers and we ignored their illegal behaviors. We just polished the records to deal with the officials from the provincial authorities," Liu told the court.

Pigs tested positive for clenbuterol, a chemical poisonous to humans, which is banned in China and yet continues to appear in the food chain.