A facility producing dumped bean sprouts containing banned substances that has been operating since early 2025 in Bac Giang has just been discovered by authorities. Photo: Document

At the scene, as reported by Vietnam Television, a production facility with dozens of containers of toxic bean sprouts was uncovered. The owner of the bean sprout factory used an unauthorized growth stimulant mixed with water to incubate bean sprouts. Instead of 6 days, when using this substance, the incubation time was shortened to only 3 days and the quality of the bean sprouts was improved.

In front of the television camera, the bean sprout factory owner explained that the reason for using banned substances in production was because if they did it for real, they would not be able to compete. This can be understood that the bean sprout market is full of stimulants and to survive and make a profit, in this unhealthy market competition, the producers have disregarded the health and lives of consumers.

The case has also been decided to prosecute criminally, but a painful question still lingers: Why was a not-so-small bean production facility, located in a central location, supplying tons of toxic bean sprouts every day, widely transported and consumed, but had been operating for 6 months before being discovered; allowing 60 tons of bean sprouts "soaked" with toxic chemicals to be consumed, to every meal of tens of thousands of people. Public opinion has the right to ask, where were the authorities, while we have a whole monitoring system at the grassroots level, from market management forces, organizations, police, neighborhood groups, to the eyes and ears of the people?


Nearly 100 tons of fake food have been produced and consumed in the capital Hanoi since 2015, but were only recently discovered, raising big questions about the responsibility of law enforcement.

That is also what Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh raised in a meeting to direct the handling of counterfeit goods right after hundreds of tons of fake functional foods were discovered in Hanoi: “Smuggling, making hundreds of tons of counterfeit goods without the authorities knowing, while to do this, there must be warehouses, buying and selling activities, transportation, then there are only two possibilities: One is no longer having the will to fight, two is being bribed, there is negativity. Both of these must be handled seriously. Someone must be responsible”.

Along with that frank assessment of the nature of the matter, the Prime Minister simultaneously issued an order: Working groups must be immediately established from the central to provincial and city levels to review and crack down on banned and counterfeit goods.

In the near future, along with the establishment of teams to crack down on counterfeit and banned goods, when the peak campaigns are vigorously deployed by provinces and cities, not only the 60 tons of bean sprouts "soaked" with chemicals in Bac Giang, the people hope that many more shady cases will be brought to light. But the question of the responsibility of the management apparatus, the enforcement apparatus in the face of the phenomenon of losing the will to fight and being bribed still remains.

After Bac Giang, today (May 27), boxes of bean sprouts soaked with toxic growth stimulant chemicals were discovered in Lao Cai province. Photo: Document

There have been many cases of bribery and embezzlement that have been exposed and handled, but recently, the case has become more prominent when Son Lam Pharmaceutical Company bribed 71 billion VND to bribe nearly 100 leaders and officials in the fields of health and social insurance in many provinces and cities from North to South to be facilitated in the process of implementing drug supply contracts.

Not just 6 months like the bean sprouts case in Bac Giang, this complicated case has been going on since 2015 until now to be discovered. It is unbelievable that such a big negative loophole existed in the system for nearly 10 years before being discovered.

Therefore, although the crackdown on counterfeit and contraband goods is an urgent task at present, if we only focus on the surface, it is not enough. There is another step that must be investigated to the end, which is the loophole in the mechanism and operating procedures of the management apparatus. If there is no drastic and synchronous solution from the root, if the "cage of mechanism" is not tight, not strong enough to "lock up power", then I am afraid that the peak campaigns to crack down on counterfeit and contraband goods in the market and at production facilities will only be effective at the surface.

Kim Oanh

Source: https://huengaynay.vn/kinh-te/lo-hong-tu-hang-gia-153842.html