Bad canned fish donated to Thailand's flood victims
Five bridges, six schools, 78 roads, and 2,225 rai (880 acres) of farmland are under water in Thailand’s deep South.
Victims of the flooding have been given relief kits that included cans of fish that TOC News described as “rotten.”
Several residents dumped the cans in front of their City Hall in protest.
Thailand’s The Nation reported hundreds of flood victims became sick from apparent food poisoning linked to the donated fish.
The Nation explains that Thailand’s FDA “is studying the legal process on whether to charge the company for violating the law by illegally producing canned fish and other canned food items after its factory was closed by the local public health office due to a substandard production process and producing poor quality products.”
America’s Good Samaritan law protects people that donate food to those in the event it accidentally makes someone sick.
Of course, the law stipulates that the donor cannot consciously and voluntarily offer any food that is 
“likely to be harmful to the health and well-being of another person.”
The manufacturer of the assumedly improperly canned fish “could face a fine of up to Bt30,000 and see bosses jailed for up to three years due to the substandard factory. It could also face a fine of Bt50,000 to Bt100,000, plus jail terms of six months to 10 years for the firm's bosses for fraudulent food production or fake labeling.”
Nice try, guys. Flood victims deserve safe food, too.
Former Tasting and Complaining host forced to resign as Thai PM
Thailand's prime minister was forced out of office Tuesday along with his Cabinet after a court ruled that he had broken a conflict-of-interest law by hosting TV cooking shows.
There sure is a lot of crap on TV cooking shows. We covered it in our 2004 paper here.
Others have apparently borrowed our idea. Imitation is a form of flattery, I guess. Or it's just posing.
Samak Sundaravej's 73, a self-proclaimed foodie, hosted a popular television cooking show — "Tasting and Complaining" — for seven years before becoming prime minister. But he also made several appearances after taking office, breaking a constitutional prohibition on private employment while in office.
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Food safety in Thailand
On Thursday I spent a couple of hours with some visiting food safety types from Thailand, sharing our experiences with on-farm food safety and fresh produce.
Near the end of the talk, I put up a sample of a daily FSnet mailing for additional information. For policy analyst Thepchoo Sripoti, left, with Thailand’s National Food Institute, light bulbs went off. He said,
“I am a big fan of your FSNET for almost 7 years. It gives me new information on food safety around the world. Wish you have a great success all the way.”
Thanks for the kind words and the visit.
