China's food safety watchdog has now promised to investigate a report that more than half of the water coolers in Beijing use counterfeit branded water.
The water is either tap water or purified water from small suppliers put into the water jugs and sealed with fake quality standard marks, according to the the Beijing Times newspaper and reported here by the AP. The newspaper said that local officials shut down a Beijing bottled water distributing station and seized safety seals and labels bearing the names of local brands.
"Problems found with some individual cases cannot be interpreted to mean that the entire water industry has problems," a government official said at a news conference in typical bureaucratic fashion. The Beijing Times investigation relied heavily on an anonymous sales manager of an unnamed well-known bottled water brand, and reporters gave firsthand accounts of the forging process at various points in the supply chain.
The report said the practice is widespread because water from major suppliers can cost twice as much as water from other sources. Suppliers keep track of how carefully their customers inspect the deliveries, and give jugs with fake or no seals to the inattentive, the report said.
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