Smoking and Spitting... Chinese Pickled Napa Cabbage Factory Head Fined 200 Million Won

Fine of 1 Million Yuan Imposed on Company Head
Factory Operations Suspended

Last year, a video showing unsanitary practices at a Chinese pickled napa cabbage factory spread widely and sparked controversy. In response, Chinese authorities have taken strong measures by imposing a fine of 200 million won on the company’s representative and suspending the factory’s operations.

A Chinese pickled napa cabbage factory worker spitting. Screenshot from SNS

According to Chinese media outlets such as the Beijing Daily on February 2, the Market Supervision Administration of Xingcheng City, Liaoning Province, imposed a fine of 1 million yuan (approximately 209.65 million won) on the head of the pickled napa cabbage factory for violating food hygiene regulations. Authorities also separately fined the company 50,000 yuan (about 10.48 million won) and ordered a suspension of production and business operations.

This action was taken after a video filmed at a Chinese pickled napa cabbage factory in October last year spread on social networking services (SNS), fueling public outrage. The footage showed a worker entering a pickling vat while wearing shoes, smoking while working, and spitting. In some scenes, the worker appeared to rub the inside of the vat with his feet.

The video quickly spread not only in China but also in South Korea, provoking a strong backlash. Online, people criticized the incident, saying, "Trust in food safety has collapsed," and "I will never eat Chinese pickled vegetables again."

An investigation by the Xingcheng City Market Supervision Administration revealed that the company had not assigned a food safety manager and had failed to properly establish or implement a food safety management system. Furthermore, the factory lacked basic management systems for hygiene, including raw material inspection, production process management, product inspection, and personnel management.

This is not the first time the Chinese food industry has faced hygiene controversies. In 2021, a so-called "naked cabbage" video emerged, showing workers shirtless while pickling cabbage at a kimchi factory, drawing international criticism. In 2022, a consumer report program exposed footage of a worker manufacturing pickled foods barefoot with a cigarette in his mouth. In 2023, another scandal broke out when a video surfaced of a man urinating in a beer ingredient storage area at a brewery in Qingdao, Shandong Province. These repeated incidents have led to criticism that hygiene issues surrounding Chinese food products resurface whenever they are about to be forgotten.