The government conducted origin labeling inspections at MT (Membership Training) villages frequently visited by university students, such as Daeseong-ri in Gapyeong and Eulwang-ri in Yeongjongdo, and identified 23 businesses violating origin labeling regulations.
The National Agricultural Products Quality Management Service (NAQS) under the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs announced on the 9th that from the 25th of last month to the 5th of this month, a 10-day special inspection titled "Special Origin Labeling Inspection in Team-Building Areas Popular Among University Students for the New Semester" was conducted. During this period, 12 businesses that falsely labeled the origin of their products were criminally charged, and 11 businesses that failed to label the origin were fined a total of 1,157,000 KRW.
The Gyeonggi branch of NAQS planned this special inspection targeting major team-building areas as university students resumed new semester team-building activities following the end of the COVID-19 pandemic and the return to normal daily life.
This special inspection focused intensively on restaurants, butcher shops, and pensions around Daeseong-ri in Gapyeong, Eulwang-ri in Yeongjongdo, and Jebudo in Hwaseong, deploying five special judicial police teams from the Metropolitan Agricultural and Food Investigation Team.
As a result of the inspection, 10 restaurants, 10 butcher shops, and 3 pensions and camping sites near these areas were found to have used foreign ingredients while falsely labeling them as domestic or failing to label the origin. The main items violated were pork (8 cases), napa cabbage kimchi (7 cases), beef (3 cases), and others (5 cases).
A restaurant located in Jebudo, Hwaseong City, which also operates a pension, was criminally charged for falsely labeling Chinese napa cabbage kimchi as domestic. Additionally, a butcher shop in a mart located in Daeseong-ri, Gapyeong-gun, was fined for failing to label the origin of beef included in camping Mille-Feuille Nabe meal kit products, which contained New Zealand beef.
The 12 businesses caught for false labeling will be further investigated by NAQS special judicial police officers and referred to the prosecution. Mandatory education will also be imposed to prevent recurrence in the future.
Lee Jong-tae, head of the Gyeonggi branch of NAQS, stated, "Since origin violations were still confirmed in this special inspection, we plan to continuously monitor blind spots in origin labeling to prevent the mislabeling of cheap foreign ingredients as domestic and actively manage origin labeling."
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