Gyeonggi Special Judicial Police Crack Down on Illegal Activities of School Meal Ingredient Suppliers

Gyeonggi Province will conduct crackdowns on illegal activities targeting school meal ingredient suppliers in the new semester.

The Gyeonggi Province Special Judicial Police announced on the 5th that from the 11th to the 29th of this month, they will intensively crack down on illegal activities targeting suppliers of agricultural and marine products, livestock products, kimchi, and other school meal ingredients.

The Gyeonggi Special Judicial Police explained that this measure is to inspect the safety and quality control status of school meal ingredients in line with the March school opening period, aiming to ensure the health and safety of growing students.

The Gyeonggi Provincial Special Judicial Police Agency will conduct crackdowns on illegal activities targeting companies supplying school meal ingredients in celebration of the new school term in March.

The main crackdown targets include ▲ unauthorized or unreported business activities ▲ storage of products past their expiration date for cooking or sales purposes ▲ violations of food preservation standards and specifications ▲ violations of mandatory self-quality inspections ▲ false or misleading origin labeling, among others.

Under the current Food Sanitation Act, anyone who manufactures, processes, cooks, sells, subdivides, transports, displays, or stores products or food past their expiration date or their raw materials for sales purposes, or sells them, is subject to imprisonment of up to 3 years or a fine of up to 30 million won.

Additionally, violations of food preservation standards and specifications can result in imprisonment of up to 5 years or a fine of up to 50 million won, and false or misleading origin labeling under the Origin Labeling Act can lead to imprisonment of up to 7 years or a fine of up to 100 million won.

Hong Eun-gi, head of the Gyeonggi Province Special Judicial Police, stated, "We will strictly punish substandard school meal manufacturers and suppliers caught through this investigation," adding, "We will do our best to ensure food safety that threatens the health and safety of students."