Global food scare from Japan nuclear plant widening out

Countries across the world shun­ned Japanese food imports yesterday as radioactive steam leaked from a disaster-struck nuclear plant, straining nerves in Tokyo.

Russia ordered a halt to food imports from four prefectures – Fukushima, Gunma, Ibaraki and Tochigi – near the stricken plant 250 kilometres northeast of Tokyo.

Moscow also placed in quarantine a Panama-flagged cargo ship that had passed near the plant and put its 19 crew under medical supervision after detecting radiation levels three times the norm in the engine room.

Australia banned produce from the area, including seaweed and seafood, milk, dairy products, fresh fruit and vegetables.

It said, however, that Japanese food already on store shelves was safe, as it had been shipped before the quake, and that “the risk of Australian consumers being ex­posed to radionuclides in food imported from Japan is negligible”.

Singapore also suspended imports of milk products and other foodstuffs from the same four prefectures and Canada implemented enhanced import controls on products from the quartet.

The Philippines banned Japanese chocolate imports.

“Food safety issues are an additional dimension of the emergency,” said three UN agencies in a joint statement issued in Geneva, pledging they were “committed to mobilising their knowledge and expertise” to help Japan. Japan was taking the right actions, said the International Atomic Energy Agency, World Health Organisation, and Food and Agriculture Organisation.

“Food monitoring is being implemented, measurements of radioactivity in food are taking place, and the results are being communicated publicly.”

In greater Tokyo, an urban sprawl of more than 30 million people, strong aftershocks over­night and in the morning served as uncomfortable reminders that Japan’s capital itself is believed to be decades overdue for a mega-quake.

The anxiety was compounded by the Tokyo government’s revelation on Wednesday that radioactive iodine in the drinking water was more than twice the level deemed safe for infants, although it remained within safe adult limits.

The news triggered a run on bottled water in shops and the city’s ubiquitous vending machines, while the Tokyo government start­ed to give families three 550-millilitre bottles of water per infant. A measurement yesterday was in the safe zone for infants again, officials said, but this was not enough to soothe all parents of young children.

Japan’s government has also halted shipments of untreated milk and vegetables from Fukushima and three adjoining prefectures, and stepped up radiation monitoring at another six, covering an area that borders Tokyo. The Health Ministry has detected 82,000 becquerels of radioactive caesium – 164 times the safe limit – in the green vegetable kukitachina, and elevated levels in another 10 vegetables, including cabbage and turnips.