Li Changjiang, head of the General Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, said officials were focusing on stricter market access requirements for companies, conducting random checks and beefing up product testing.

But he stressed that China was not the only one with problems, citing comments by World Health Organization Director-General Margaret Chan this week that the agency receives about 200 reports of food safety problems every month from its 193 member states.

"This shows that food safety is not an issue of a particular country or region," Li said at a news conference.

In a statement released Friday, Li's administration said it had pulled the business license of Taixing Glycerin Factory, which has been accused of exporting diethylene glycol a thickening agent used in antifreeze and fraudulently passing it off as 99.5 percent pure glycerin.

The "TD glycerin" mix of 15 percent diethylene glycol, or DEG, and other substances eventually ended up in Panamanian medicines that killed at least 51 people.