Recall Expanded to Some Dry Cat Food

Cornell University scientists also have found the chemical, sometimes used as a fertilizer....New York officials have detected melamine as well, though it's not clear how that chemical would have poisoned pets. It's typically used to produce plastic kitchen wares, though it's apparently used as a fertilizer in Asia

Here's where we start to find the link between the petrochemical companies and the food problems. An important note, all the gmo crops are made by the companies that were historically known as petrochemicals but now have modified seeds to either produce the pesticides that were once just applied as pesticides or to tolerate dousing by herbicides that will kill all traditional plant forms.

In this case a manufacturer of industrial melamine for China refers to their product as different from BASF, another company that now creates the novel seeds and calls the business "life sciences" instead of chemicals.

Now a google for industrial melamine basf gives us another clue who may be involved, just a clue.

Anhydrous high-pressure melamine synthesis - Patent 4565867
In the BASF process melamine is manufactured by heating urea to ... available for the melamine product such as as a high-nitrogen, time-release fertilizer. ...
www.freepatentsonline.com/4565867.html - 57k - Cached - Similar pages

Storage-stable melamine dispersion - Patent 5125952
Texaco Polypropylene Glycol 2000 and BASF-Wyandotte Pluracol C-133 are ... The melamine dispersion was poured into the liquid fertilizer and stirred to form ...
www.freepatentsonline.com/5125952.html - 56k -

While access to this isn't available it seems the patent is held by either Texaco or BASF, perhaps jointly but a user in one of the threads talking about assigning blame to China correctly pointed out that it might be that some bigger culpret was behind this and the quick scapegoat of China was used.

Many multinationals exploit the lower environmental and health laws abroad to do business that would never be allowed in a developed country. It is possible we will never find the maker of the poison but we know that the patent holders are in some way getting income from the products and the patent holder of record is in the USA!!

Title:
Anhydrous high-pressure melamine synthesis
Document Type and Number:
United States Patent 4565867
Link to this page:
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4565867.html

This article written in Warsaw talks about how global use has doubled and again we see BASF and other giants.

." The South American market is growing at a rate of almost 6 percent a year, and the total melamine production of the Americas is smaller than that of ZAP. Melamine consumption on these markets is estimated at around 120,000 tonnes annually.

Now on to the companies who have melamine and wheat like this one and the LLC or LTD structure always rings a bell as a sub or shell possibility, not a convicting bit of info just a strong clue that a limited liability structure is shielding something.

Product Catalog - SHANDONG OCEAN CHEMICAL GROUP CO.,LTD (China ...
Product Description: Melamine is a kind of organic chemical with even texture. ... Country of Origin: Made In China . Product Description: WHEAT FLOUR ...

And lo and behold searching on Shandong Chemical brings us to one of the biggest collection of crooks ever to exploit US foreign policy to their financial advantage, Carlyle Group as a possible investor in another in the "business development zone" in Shandong China for petrochemicals.

Carlyle Group will not likely to become a controlling shareholder but just make investment in Shandong Haihua due to the precedent of the bumpy stake acquisition of Xuzhou Construction Machinery Group. The potential investor will buy into the company more cautiously via acquisition of partial equities and capital expansion as expected earlier, industry analysts believed.

Does this mean they are guilty of the tainted food? Nope, but it means they are intimately familiar with every bit of the local business climate. With the private nature of Carlyle they don't need to disclose investments and with the subs and holding companies set up to hide the trails this may be as close as we get, but it means Carlyle is part of the western multinationals with a hand in the problem and it isn't any surprise to me.

If you don't know the name Carlyle Group, here are some of their key players in the private venture, making money the old fashioned way, by making laws and trade agreements that suit their needs.

More and more human food is being imported from China. Not just fruits and other things that have imported for decades but also things like fish, meats, grains, canned goods of all types, pet foods, and more and more candies.

The last one is of particular concern because much of it is aimed at children. There have already been several candy recalls because the Chinese-made candies used dyes and colorants containing lead.

Lack of regulations and/or disregard for regulations are going to lead to more such cases.