Food safety


Daxi Dried Bean Curd (the terms ‘dried bean curd’ and ‘dried tofu’ are used interchangeably in this article) has gone through food safety crises several times before. The source of the information below is from the Chinese Wikipedia version.

  1. - In December 1987, in the bean products in Daxi Town of Taoyuan County were found preservatives, bleach, safrole toxin, and/or dimethyl yellow. The affected products were destroyed. Government made a law to forbid using dimethyl yellow and then developed No.5 and No.6 food coloring to replace it.
  2. - On June 7, 2013, a 100-year-old bean curd shop, Youxiefeng, added the paint dye saponin to make yellow bean curd. Saponin is an industrial dye. Excessive exposure can cause liver damage, and long-term exposure can lead to an increased risk of liver cancer.
  3. - On December 6, 2014, the Hong Kong media reported that a well-known bean curd store in Taichung, Dec Chang, was suspected of adding ‘dimethyl yellow’ dyeing material by the Food Safety Center. Daxi Dried Bean Curd is also affected.


Because of all these events, especially the news reported by the Hong Kong media, people in Taiwan had a bad impression of Daxi Dried Bean Curd. At that time, most people weren’t willing to eat dried bean curd, so it caused an economic depression of the Daxi dried bean curd industry. In order to regain its credibility, the dried bean curd industry in Daxi not only sent the products to Health Bureau for inspection, but also provided proof to show that their products were safe. They also did research and development on new products so that customers could eat delicious and safe dried bean curd at the same time.

Huang Ri-Xiang, a well-known dried bean curd store in Daxi, provided some ways to cope with food safety. First, bean products are made in-house to make sure the process of making dried bean curd is safe, and they only use edible gypsum. Secondly, they send their products to Health Bureau to ensure that there are no additives that will harm the health of the consumers. Lastly, their products are logged in the Health Bureau website, so people can go online to check whether they meet the health and safety criteria.

In order to improve the food safety, Taoyuan City Government and Economy and Development Bureau have jointly promoted the “Taoyuan Micro-Food Industry Health and Safety Improvement Subsidy Program” (Note 1) to counsel the dried bean curd manufacturers in environmental sanitation and manufacturing processes improvement to ensure good product quality in order to enhance the advantage and competitiveness in the market place. Some activities have also been launched to revitalize and promote the industry, such as the Daxi Dried Tofu Festival and the Food Safety Exhibition.

Note 1:
The Taoyuan Micro-Food Industry Health and Safety Improvement Subsidy Program
http://www.idn.com.tw/news/news_content.php?artid=20170728sean011