PANZHUANGZI, CHINA — Before dawn each day, Gao Penghong and his wife join scores of other farmers in this dairy-rich village who must walk their cows to a local milk collection station because of new safety requirements.
A byproduct of China's deadly tainted-milk scandal, the mile-long walks to the station come as officials push for more critical supervision of dairy farmers. Only weeks ago, farmers were free to milk their cows at home and deliver the product in heavy metal containers.
But now some observers see dairy farmers, who exist at the lowest level of the milk production cycle, as having the most financial incentive to spike milk to boost protein readings. Other food safety experts say it's unlikely that small-time farmers are behind the scandal, because they generally lack the knowledge to cause such widespread contamination.
Milk contaminated with the industrial chemical melamine is blamed for killing four babies and sickening 54,000 others with kidney stones and other illnesses. The food safety crisis, China's worst in decades, has also led to numerous arrests, an international recall of Chinese products containing milk and at least one lawsuit against a milk company.
Experts point to a growing black market for powdered melamine among food makers in China and elsewhere. There are numerous parties involved in moving milk from the cow to the consumer, including collection stations, middle men and manufacturers. The adulteration, analysts say, could come anywhere in the process.
Melamine, which is used in plastics and laminates, has also been used by the unscrupulous to bulk up livestock feed, pet food and now baby formula.
In tests to determine a food's nutritional value, melamine shows up as protein, so it has been added to make products appear more nutritious. Though nontoxic, it can combine with other chemicals in the body to form crystals in the kidneys that can cause renal failure, experts say.
Last year, melamine-laced food products shipped from China to pet food companies in the U.S. and elsewhere were blamed in the deaths of thousands of dogs and cats.
Jorgen Schlundt, the World Health Organization's director of food safety, thinks powdered melamine might be produced in underground factories in China, beyond the realm of small-time farmers.
"It's very unlikely that single farmers are responsible -- and significantly more likely it's the work of the collection centers," he said. "You have to treat the melamine before you use it. It's more complex than just putting a little powder into milk."
