President ASAG, Zheng Du presented at 2014 Policy Partnership on Food Security (PPFS) Government and Business Dialogue Conference on Food Security and Trade of APEC in Ningbo, China
2014 Policy Partnership on Food Security (PPFS) Government and Business Dialogue Conference on Food Security and Trade of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) was held in Ningbo, China on February 21, 2014. During the conference, Zheng Du, professor and president of Academy of State Administration of Grain, made a speech on “Strengthen the standard and technical cooperation, improve the level of grain quality and safety”.
Du pointed out that food safety has become a global strategic issue and all the regions were committed to improve the technical regulations and standards of food safety. Grain is the most fundamental and important food material and its quality is very important for the assurance of food safety. As the developing country with more than 1.3 billion people, China has made great effort in increasing the total grain supply, expanding grain and food diversity, and improving national nutrition level since the founding of New China, and the whole situation is tending to be good. However, the problems of grain quality and safety caused by environment pollution and abnormal climate became increasingly prominent recently. The post-harvest losses of grain and the problems of food safety induced by grain mildew are serious. Grain trade disputes and frictions induced by grain quality appeared constantly.
To standardize the production, circulation, processing and trade of grain, promote the fairness and convenience of trade, accelerate the effective connection of quality standards between grain exporting and importing countries, and enhance the quality and utilization of grain, we would like to suggest to set up a communication platform on grain standards, quality and safety in Asia-Pacific region, establish a specific working group and carry out three cooperative actions including jointly coping with grain mildew damage, advocating zero foreign materials grain trade, and promoting the complementarity of grain quality.
The speech was highly regarded and got positive response from the representatives. After conference, Du was interviewed on grain quality and safety by CCTV.
