BEIJING — China's Ministry of Agriculture says a recent nationwide crackdown on the use of illegal veterinary drugs has already significantly improved the quality and safety of the country's seafood production.
Regulators say that over the last year, more than 30,000 inspectors have fanned out across the country, working to close shoddy seafood operations and enforce regulations against the use of banned antibiotics, like chloramphenicol and malachite green, which is thought to cause cancer.
But officials from the ministry's fisheries bureau also say that pollution and water quality problems are e now the biggest challenges facing the nation's fish farming or aquaculture industry, something they have rarely acknowledged in public.
"Water quality is the top issue for Chinese aquaculture," Ding Xiaoming, the director of aquaculture in the fisheries bureau, said on Tuesday. "Without good water quality, Chinese aquaculture cannot develop."
During a 30-minute interview at the Ministry of Agriculture in Beijing, Mr. Ding said the country's rapid urbanization and industrialization was responsible for spoiling the environment and polluting waterways that are used by factory-style fish farms, a situation that experts say has forced some farmers to turn to illegal drugs.