China's cooking oil scandal prompts residents to buy oil presses amid food safety concerns

A controversy over cooking oil in China has prompted locals to take matters into their own hands as they strive to procure alternative supplies amid worries over the safety of edible oils available in the market.

They are turning to making their own oil by buying household oil press machines. According to local reports, sales of these machines in the past two weeks have exceeded sales over the six-month period.

Search volumes for oil press machines jumped 22 folds, and sales volumes rose 4 times between July 5 and July 12, compared to sales before the scandal broke, local media reported, citing data from online retailer JD.com.

"It's not even opened yet, should I eat it or not?" a post on social media platform Xiaohongshu, captioning a video of a bottle of cooking oil, showcased locals' worries. "It's a shame to throw it away, but I'm afraid of going to the hospital and spending all my money if I eat it," the user, based in China's Guangxi province, added. Certain hashtags discussing the scandal also appear to have been censored on some platforms.

China's authorities have launched an investigation into food safety concerns after domestic media revealed that a major state-owned company, Sinograin, had been using tankers that carry fuel to transport cooking oil.

These containers were not cleaned between the loads, according to Chinese Communist Party-owned Beijing News. Private conglomerate Hopefull Grain and Oil Group was also named in the report.

Other truckers interviewed for the report noted that in a bid to save costs, oftentimes these tankers are not cleaned before transporting edible liquids like cooking oil, soybean oil and syrup in China. Some edible oil manufacturers also do not strictly check or enforce whether or not