Food Safety Site “Throw it Out the Window” Gets Government Support

Last week, we wrote about Throw it Out the Window, the food-safety platform built by a Chinese college student that’s been garnering a lot of attention and momentum of late. In the week since then, China has seen more food safety scandals (in other news, the sky remains blue), but the potentially-sensitive Throw it Out the Window also got some support in the form of an attaboy from Shanghai food safety officials.

According to the Dongfang Daily, Shanghai Food Safety Committee deputy director Yan Zuqiang and others from his office traveled to Fudan University yesterday to meet with Wu Heng, the founder of Throw it Out the Window. Although the site’s content is presumably pretty embarassing to them — it turns up 102 reports of food safety scandals in Shanghai over the last eight years — the officials told Wu that the government supported his website and hoped he would continue to operate it. The office even made a post on its official weibo account saying that deputy director Yan affirms the good work that Wu is doing and that the government supports Throw it Out the Window.

It’s worth noting that this “support” appears to be just moral support; a confirmation that what Wu is doing is good and that he can keep doing it. If the government offered any financial support to Wu — which I highly doubt — that information has not been disclosed.

Apparently, government support of the site was not assured. Last year, Wu says, he received several calls from government officials about it but the matter was ultimately left unsettled. It’s unclear whether the site was in any real peril then, but we’re definitely glad to see representatives of Shanghai’s government come down on the side of transparency and openness by allowing the site to continue to operate, even though it makes them look somewhat incompetent (or perhaps they’re just underfunded).

[Dongfang Daily via Sina Tech]