FOOD ADULTERATION.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 178, 29 July 1932, Page 8

FOOD ADULTERATION.

METHODS OF EARLY TIMES. In a lecture given before the Auckland branch of the New Zealand Sanitary Inspectors' Association last evening, Mr. A J Parker, public analyst, described how food was adulterated a century or more ago. Until drastic legislation wae passed in England, he said food adulteration wae rampant, and it was only by the continual pressure brought on the Government by medical men that the nrst Act'of Parliament on the subject was Pa from the earliest ages adulteration was practised by- the Chinese. A substance that was sold as tea was made of tea leaf dust, leaves and. sand stuck with starch or gum into little masses, and coloured black or green. In England leaves of the willow, poplar and plane were mixed with tea and sold as "genuine tea. Tea leaves that had been used were bought from restaurants and other places at 3d a lb, mixed with gum solution, and put up in packets and sold. Wheat, peas, beans, rye and acorns had all been prepared, roasted and mixed with coffee beans and sold as "pure;" Cocoa had aleo been "doctored." Before the present safeguarding laws were passed foods of all descriptions were adulterated. Sugar confectionery was par- | ticularly subject to injurious adulteration ; by non-poisonous aniline dyes.