This time it is not about the corrupted baby formula or toys coated with lead paint. The Ministry of Public Safety in China on the 3rd of May 2013 announced that more than 900 people criminal ring has been apprehended with 200,000 tons of illegal lamb meat made from rat meat.

These criminals harvested their so called meat from rats, mink, and fox mixed with red food coloring. They are then sold as lamb’s meat in Shanghai and Jiangsu province in hot pot restaurants and this has been ongoing since 2009. The fake meat however, was never tested or inspected by the health authorities before they are made available for human consumption.

One would have imagined that rats don’t really ever live the cleanest lifestyles but yet they ended up on innocent people plates.

The Public Safety Authorities has said that the police have also investigated about 400 cases of meat violations in China. In one of the major industrial cities in eastern China called Wuxi, these unscrupulous traders has netted a whopping 10 million renminbi which is an equivalent of about $1.6 million from the sale of rat meat being sold as lambs.

In the same vein, there was another case in February of this year in the Liaoning Province in China, where the police arrested 34 criminals and captured 40 tons of duck which has been mixed with chemicals and mutton grease to make it look and taste like ducks meat and they are being sold as lambs’ meat.

The Supreme People’s Court has in the wake of this new evidence rolled out new guidelines which will bring in harsher punishment for making and selling foods that are poisonous and unsafe for human consumption. Thus, China penal code has not specify what acts will constitute a violation of the law and that is why the Supreme People’s Court has now considered listing crimes specific acts like the sale of food corrupted with chemicals or made from animals that died as a result of known and unknown diseases.

All makers of adulterated baby foods that lacks all the necessary nutrition and negligent government food and health inspectors who have refused to do their jobs thoroughly will also be punished as crime under the new guidelines.

Pei Xianding, a Chinese Supreme Court judge has said at a news conference that: “The situation is really grave and has indeed caused great harm to the people and we cannot tolerate it any longer. We must punish the criminals severely, or we cannot answer to our people”. Pei quoted.

The Supreme Court has since prosecuted about 2,088 people in cases of food safety in 2010-2012. In 2012 alone, 861 cases of poisonous food were handled by Chinese courts and 80 cases were prosecuted in 2010. These problems have grown over the years in China and it is quite alarming.