Since the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, radioactive contaminants have periodically been discovered in food imports from Japan
HONG KONG — A sample of powdered tea imported from the Japanese prefecture of Chiba, just southeast of Tokyo, contained traces of radioactive cesium 137, the Hong Kong government announced late Thursday evening, but they were far below the legal maximum level.
The discovery was not the first of its kind. The government’s Center for Food Safety found three samples of vegetables from Japan with “unsatisfactory” levels of radioactive contaminants in March 2011, the month that nuclear reactors in Fukushima, northeast of Tokyo, suffered partial meltdowns following a powerful earthquake and tsunami.
Other samples of Japanese food have occasionally been found to have low levels of radiation since the Fukushima disaster, the Hong Kong food center said.
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Correction: March 13, 2015
An earlier version of this article misstated the results of radiation testing by the Hong Kong government on tea from Japan and the Hong Kong government’s response. The sample with low levels of radiation was at 0.93 percent of the legal limit, not 9.3 times the legal limit. The importer voluntarily withdrew the tea; the Hong Kong government did not ban its sale.
Read more at Hong Kong Finds Small Amount of Radioactivity in Sample of Japanese Tea
The wrong version of this article is cited at Highly Radioactive Contamination Found in Shipment of Tea From Japan via The Daily Meal
