Fonterra knew the milk was contaminated
I am actually very surprised to find out that today's the first time many in New Zealand know this fact. The current evidence shows that Fonterra learnt the whole issues sometimes in Augest last year, a month ealier before the whole thing made public.
As the Herald reported today, Fonterra confirms that it has sent Sanlu an European Union "provisional statement" on health effects of melamine, the file states a safe level of concentration below 20mg/kg . I blogged this in my Chinese blog month ago, but forgot to mention it here:)
This changes the whole situation a bit though, what I knew was an "EU standards", not "provisional statement". One of the reasons why Sanlu kept selling tainted milk powders even after contaminants were discovered, is because that its boss, Tian Wenhua was confident that the "standard" provided by Fonterra shows there's a safe level, so Sanlu mixed good powders with bad ones to keep the concentration of melamine in individual packaging below that level. To this date the evidence shows that they really did well to control the concentration of melamine below 10mg/kg for products after August.
As reported by Chinese media, Fonterra directors did not "reject" the whole idea of the controlling measures - this tells me Fonterra not just knew the contamination, but also did not try to stop production of melamine contaminated milk.
Now this directly contradicts to what Fonterra said today:
" ... However, he (Andrew Ferrier) said Fonterra was "vividly clear" to Sanlu that the only acceptable level of melamine was zero"
Really? So what happened between August and September? They dodgy Chinese did all without Fonterra's knowledge? Well, we are talking about common sense here, if you got a 43% stake in a large company, and you know it is in trouble, will you keep your eyes shut on your investment?
I still maintain my position, although none of Fonterra directors faced court in China, they should at least face investigations here at home.
