Canadian ViewersAlabama Bans Imported Catfish
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) - Alabama Agriculture Commissioner Ron Sparks announced a ban on the sale of catfish from China on Wednesday after antibiotics prohibited in the United States were found in the product.
Sparks said 20 samples of catfish from China were collected for testing by the department of agriculture over the last few weeks. Of those samples, 14 tested positive for the antibiotic fluoroquinolones, which the Food and Drug Administration banned from use in food-producing animals in 1997.
"We are sending notice today that we are not going to continue to sit by and let these foreign countries produce their food at a different standard than we ask our farmers to produce by and then send those products in here at a cheaper price," Sparks said.
Agriculture department chemists also tested 13 samples of basa fish from Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia, with five of the samples testing positive for antibiotics. Sparks said additional testing is required before a decision is made to ban basa fish.
The samples that tested positive represent about 214,260 pounds of fish that will not be sold. About 300,000 pounds of fish also have been suspended pending further analysis.
Lance Hester, the state's food safety director, said the exposure of fish to the banned antibiotics is not accidental. He said the antibiotics are used to kill bacteria in the water.
Sparks said he will not lift the ban on Chinese catfish until he is convinced the problem is solved -- until there is no evidence the forbidden antibiotics are used.
"It's pretty obvious they haven't heard my message from Alabama," he said. "But some way or other we're going to get this message from Alabama to those foreign countries that if you continue to use chemicals that have been banned by the FDA, when we find it, we're going to stop it. It's that simple."
Sparks said he has already been in touch with people in the fish industry in the state who have purchased contaminated fish. He said the department of agriculture will continue to help them test fish.
"We applaud Ron Sparks for taking this step -- and it's not an easy step -- to protect the health and welfare of the state and the citizens of Alabama," said Butch Wilson, chairman of the Alabama Catfish Producers.
Sparks said he also communicates regularly with agricultural commissioners in other southern states, such as Mississippi, Louisiana and Georgia, which produce catfish, and he expects they "will be reacting and responding accordingly to their state and their state laws."
The extensive testing is expensive, but Joe Basile, a chemist at the department of agriculture's lab in Montgomery, said the FDA has been involved and is bearing much of the cost.
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