Fox, mink and rat sold lamb is enough to turn Chinese stomachs

Chinese people are used to dipping all manner of delicacies in their simmering hotpots, but rat, mink and fox meat have turned the stomachs of diners all over the world's most populous, and most food-obsessed, country.

There are regular scandals about food safety in the food industry, ranging from the use of the industrial chemical melamine in infant formula, which killed at least six children and sickened nearly 300,000 in 2008, to the use of toxic “gutter”, or reused, cooking oil.

Consumers have developed strong stomachs after years of food safety scandals, but there was widespread anger yesterday at news from the ministry of public security of the arrest of traders in eastern China who bought rat, fox and mink flesh and sold it as lamb.

As if that wasn't bad enough — the rat, mink and fox flesh was doused in gelatin, red pigment, and nitrates.

Over 900 people were arrested for selling fake, spoiled or adulterated meat in the past three months, Xinhua news agency reported.

A total of 382 cases were uncovered and 20,000 tons of unsafe meat seized from January.

The news came just weeks after Shanghai residents feared for their water supply after 16,000 dead pigs were found floating down a nearby river, dumped by piggeries upstream after they died of disease.

Many consumers in China have already cut out chicken because of fears about an outbreak of avian flu.

There are signs that the government is trying to do something. The government recently announced it would upgrade existing food safety watchdogs to create a new superministry, to be called the General Food and Drug Administration.