Several foreign media reports have sought to exaggerate Chinese product quality problems and food scares and given voices to companies seeking to block Chinese imports, said Vice Commerce Minister Gao Hucheng, adding this amounted to de facto trade protectionism.

Gao said isolated reports even spoke of Chinese boys as young as six growing moustaches and girls aged seven growing breasts after eating hormone-tainted food.

He also said some media had branded China-made products "killers".

"We welcome impartial media reports as they will help us seek truth from the facts and take appropriate measures to rectify problems."

"Like other governments around the world, the Chinese government is very concerned with safety and will never shirk away from finding the facts and dealing with the consequences," Gao said.

The government has long been working to erase low-quality and unsafe products such as blacklisting guilty firms, but a small minority of local companies will always seep through the cracks and get these bad products out on the market.

In an example of swift justice, in July, the government revoked the business licenses of Xuzhou Anying Biotechnology Development Company from Jiangsu Province, and Binzhou Futian Biotechnology Co., Ltd. from Shandong Province, for exporting melamine-tainted wheat protein that was included in pet food in the US and was responsible for the poisoning deaths of several cats and dogs.

Gao said the quality of Chinese products was improving steadily with surveys showing that 94 percent of Chinese vegetables met standards for pesticide residues in the first half, up 12 percent on 2003.

Commerce Minister Bo Xilai said in a statement that more than 90 percent of Chinese imported products were good and safe. He also asked all parties to consider China-made products in an objective and rational manner.

The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare in Japan, China's biggest food importer, said in July that 99.42 percent of the imported food from China in 2006 met safety standards, surpassing the 99.38 percent of the European Union and 98.69 percent of the US.

(Xinhua News Agency August 3, 2007)