Pet owners vs manufacturers
Xin Rui heard of “toxic dog food” for the when she adopted a dog from a shelter in Beijing. ught some dog food and dog the e-commerce platform Tmall e dog shelter owner sent the dog me. dog food,” the stray dog shelter d disdainfully with a sideways the bags of dog food casually lying in the living room.
Xin bought another bag of dog food from the shelter owner as she recommended in consideration to help the dog get used to its new home sooner. It did not take a long time for Xin to tell the differences between these products. It took a few days for the dog to get used to the food recommended by the stray dog base owner. But the dog entirely refused to eat the food bought on Tmall, even when Xin mixed it with canned meat.
She tried four brands of dog food in the nearly two years after adopting the dog. “I do not trust the base owner as she did not tell me where she got the food. Her price is much lower than that in official stores, making me suspicious about the quality and authenticity of the food,” Xin said.
Actually, Xingtai’s case is not unique, and Xin’s worry is not unprovoked either.
Many pet owners have taken to social media platforms complaining that their dogs died or got seriously sick, for example by getting pancreatitis, after eating cheap food bought from online channels. Some of the cheap foods were revealed to have had dust and saw powder mixed in.
Even well-known pet food brands are not always trustworthy.
In April 2022, a pet owner in Hangzhou, East China’s Zhejiang Province, reported that his cats were poisoned after consuming Singen cat food, with one of them dying. After seeking information online, he discovered that many other families had encountered similar issues. Statistics gathered from 90 individuals revealed similar issues happened with 239 cats, resulting death of 95 cats, reported the Jiemian News.
Singen, founded in the island of Taiwan, claims to have a 50-year history of production. The company’s business scope includes the production of veterinary drugs, feed, and feed additives.
Besides the issue of manufacturers falsifying their own products, there have been instances of factories producing counterfeit pet food of major brands.
On March 21, Shanghai-based Observer News reported that the local police department, after thorough investigations, dismantled three dark factories in Central China’s Hunan Province and South China’s Guangdong Province involved in manufacturing and selling counterfeit cat food of a certain brand.