Dyed lettuce scandal hits China weeks after formaldehyde cabbage uproar

Chinese authorities have caught a string of businesses dyeing stem lettuce with coloring agents to make the vegetable appear fresher before sending it to market.

According to China's CCTV and other outlets, a blogger recently posted an exposé video running about one minute and 44 seconds on social media.

The blogger, who produces food and health content, captured footage of workers at a vegetable processing facility in Yuzhong County, Gansu Province, repeatedly dipping stem lettuce — known in South Korea as "gungchae" — into an unidentified green liquid.

After visiting 13 local vegetable facilities, the blogger said more than half were soaking stem lettuce in the suspicious green solution, and called on authorities to launch an active investigation.

The blogger also claimed that a product labeled "compound coloring agent" was found at one facility, and that tests on the solution detected food dye.

As the video spread online and the controversy grew, local authorities immediately launched an investigation.

Yuzhong County officials conducted a joint inspection of 53 storage and distribution businesses in the area and confirmed that six had used coloring agents during the sorting and washing of stem lettuce, in an effort to make the vegetables look fresher and more appealing.

The dye used was a food additive permitted in some products such as beverages, but its use on fresh vegetables is not allowed.

Authorities seized 11.8 tons of the tainted lettuce on site and destroyed the entire batch. The six businesses confirmed to have used the dye have been referred for investigation.

Authorities said they plan to expand inspections across Yuzhong County, covering the entire supply chain for agricultural products — from cultivation through transport, storage and sale.

Just a month ago, in August, China was rocked by reports that some rural producers had used formaldehyde to preserve the freshness of cabbage.

Formaldehyde is a colorless, highly irritating chemical classified as a Group 1 carcinogen — meaning it causes cancer in humans — by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), a body under the World Health Organization (WHO).

The reports raised safety concerns among South Korean consumers, who eat large quantities of Chinese cabbage and kimchi. South Korea's Ministry of Food and Drug Safety said it confirmed through the Korean Embassy in Beijing that the cabbage in question had not entered the country, and that tests on Chinese cabbage and cabbage kimchi conducted at the time detected no formaldehyde.

Beyond the cabbage scandal, China has seen a steady stream of food hygiene incidents. Last October, a worker at a pickled cabbage factory in Huludao, Liaoning Province, was caught on camera smoking and spitting into a pickling vat. In 2023, footage emerged of a worker urinating inside a delivery truck loaded with malt — a raw ingredient for beer — at Tsingtao Brewery's No. 3 factory, triggering widespread outrage.

The repeated food safety incidents have amplified calls within China for tighter oversight of food production and distribution.