On March 21, 2025, the news broke that “Qianhe Flavor Industry”, a veteran Chinese condiment giant, had its “Qianhe 0” soy sauce found to contain cadmium. Following this revelation, Qianhe Flavor Industry’s stock price plummeted within just four days, resulting in a staggering loss of up to 950 million yuan in market value.
The official Weibo account of “Consumer Reports” magazine released a testing report on March 18, revealing that out of the 13 soy sauces claimed to be “additive-free” sent for testing to a third-party authoritative testing institution this March, 12 were found to contain cadmium, 7 were found to contain total arsenic, with only one sauce free of the two heavy metal pollutants mentioned above. In particular, the “Qianhe Yuzang Benjiu 380-day soy sauce” tested for cadmium content reaching 0.0110mg/kg, ranking it fourth among the 13 soy sauces tested.
Cadmium is a non-essential and toxic element for the human body, with potential risks of carcinogenesis and mutagenesis; arsenic is widely present in nature, and organic and inorganic arsenic pesticides are commonly used for insecticide, fungicide, weed control, etc.
Ironically, the questioned product prominently displays the eye-catching “Qianhe 0” trademark, leading to consumer accusations of deception.
According to information from “Tianyancha”, the “Qianhe 0” trademark has a total of 12 applications, 8 of which have been registered, while 2 are in the stage of rejection review. The journalist from “Dahe News” further discovered that most of the registered “Qianhe 0” trademarks have undergone font layout adjustments, with some even adding “Qianhe 0+”.
In light of this news, as of March 21, Qianhe Flavor Industry’s stock price has experienced a consecutive four-day plunge, with a cumulative decline of 7.3%, resulting in a market value evaporation of 950 million yuan.
In a response issued late on March 20, Qianhe Flavor Industry stated that the “Qianhe Yuzang Benjiu 380-day soy sauce” mentioned in the media reports did not contain any food additives or other chemicals. The trace cadmium detected in soy sauce products originates from raw materials, but the cadmium content in the main raw materials of soy sauce meets standard requirements.
Regarding the trademark labeling of “zero additives”, Qianhe Flavor Industry expressed that there had been miscommunication with consumers, leading to misunderstandings, for which they deeply apologized.
This response from Qianhe Flavor Industry sparked dissatisfaction among netizens. “Setting aside whether the content exceeds national standards or not, isn’t ‘Qianhe 0’ playing a word game? Isn’t the attitude of the business already a problem? Even if the content is not over the limit, isn’t the idea to make consumers feel that it is 0 additives and healthy? Brands like Haitian, Laohenghe, etc., at least, do not engage in such word games.” “Stop playing word games and focus on improving the products!”
(Written in 2025)