The Cabinet has finalized a draft amendment that will set stricter food safety regulations. The proposed revisions passed on Thursday will increase the penalties for food safety offenders to up to seven years in prison and fines of up to NT$80 million (US$2.65 million).
Under the revisions, people convicted of lacing food with banned materials or falsified ingredients will also face a maximum seven-year prison sentence, up from the current maximum sentence of five years. In the case of a food safety violation causing a fatality, the offender could be sentenced to life in prison with a fine of up to NT$200 million (US$6.67 million). That’s 10 times higher than before. The new law will not be retroactively applied to previous offenses. But violators will no longer be able to invoke double jeopardy protection.
The government has been pressured to amend food safety regulations following the recent scandal in which cooking oil recycled from kitchen waste was found in many food products.
The draft amendment will be submitted to the legislature for approval.