On Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang accused the media of playing up the food safety issue and warned that frequent food scare reports could lead to consumer panic.

However, the government seems to have realized that bringing its product safety standards in line with those of its trading partners could help protect its future economic growth.

The state-run China Daily newspaper acknowledged Wednesday that Chinese food exports were at times rejected — not because the manufacturers violated guidelines, but because China's standards were lower than those of importing countries.

"This is not because the food itself was of low quality, but because the standards we use may be lower," the paper said in an editorial. "It is becoming increasingly urgent to raise the food safety standards to international levels."

Most recently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said it would detain five kinds of Chinese seafood after repeated testing turned up contamination with drugs not approved in America for use in farmed seafood.

In response, China's quality administration issued new measures designed to ensure the quality of exported farmed seafood, telling its local offices to "fully understand the side effects and major loss of the U.S. decision to the Chinese seafood industry."

In addition to stepped-up inspections and quarantine, the agency said it would post the names of companies that violate regulations and ban them from export activities for two years.

Observers say China faces an even greater challenge in improving its domestic food and product safety record.

China's food safety watchdog said Tuesday that 19.1 percent of products made for domestic consumption were found to be substandard in the first half of 2007. Canned and preserved fruit and dried fish were the most problematic, primarily because of excessive bacteria and additives, the agency said.

Though the survey covered many different products, it focused on food, common consumer goods, farming machinery and fertilizers.