The effective component of flour whitening agent, benzoyl peroxide (BPO), is called diluted benzoyl peroxide. It is a food additive introduced from abroad and widely used in flour in the late 1980s. Flour whitening agent is mainly used to bleach flour and accelerate the after-ripening of flour. On March 1 1, the Ministry of Health and other departments issued an announcement to prohibit the production and addition of food additives benzoyl peroxide and calcium peroxide in flour from May 1, and set a reasonable transition period of two months.

Whether adding benzoyl peroxide to flour destroys the nutrition of flour is actually a topic that does not need to be debated at all. The public can simply check the information themselves, whether the Ministry of Health wants to ban benzoyl peroxide or not, and judge whether benzoyl peroxide destroys the nutrition of flour. Who is talking nonsense? Who is cheating the public irresponsibly? The role of benzoyl peroxide in wheat flour is mainly to accelerate the maturity of wheat flour, and whitening is a secondary role. The principle that benzoyl peroxide can whiten flour is that flour contains a small amount of carotenoids to make flour yellow, and benzoyl peroxide can oxidize the double bond of carotene to make flour white. Some people who call for a ban take advantage of the public's ignorance of food additives to deceive the public that benzoyl oxide will destroy carotene in flour and be harmful to health, thus causing public dissatisfaction that the Ministry of Health has to use benzoyl oxide so far. Looking through the relevant reports, you will find that some reports calling for banning benzoyl peroxide tell the public that benzoyl peroxide destroys the nutrition in flour, but never provide any data to the public. Whether benzoyl peroxide will destroy the nutrition of flour is a fully verified fact. We only need to test the nutritional components of flour added with benzoyl peroxide, which can be tested by general testing departments. Those who call for prohibition only need to do a simple test to find out whether benzoyl peroxide will destroy the nutritional data of flour, which can be a good basis for banning benzoyl peroxide. Why not do this? There is only one reason: because benzoyl peroxide does not destroy the nutrients of flour at all! In fact, it is very simple for the public to know whether benzoyl peroxide destroys the nutrition of flour. As long as you enter the "food nutrition composition table" on the Internet and check the data of carotene content in various foods, you will know who is talking nonsense irresponsibly. In the table of food nutrients provided by various countries, the content of β -carotene in flour is zero, that is, flour does not contain β-carotene. In fact, the content of β -carotene in flour is very small. Both foreign countries and China regard it as. Some experts told the public that the carotene in flour was destroyed by benzoyl peroxide, which was completely irresponsible to deceive the public. In fact, flour only contains 6μg/ 100g, while vegetable broccoli contains 72 10μg/ 100g, which is more than 1200 times of flour. Carrots contain 40 10μg/ 100g, which is more than 650 times that of flour. The content of vitamin A in meat food is high, and the conversion data of pig liver is 5000 times that of flour, and that of chicken liver is more than 10000 times. For the public who are concerned about whether benzoyl peroxide destroys flour nutrition, they may wish to check the data themselves. For example, simply comparing the data, eating a bite of vegetables is equivalent to eating dozens or hundreds of kilograms of flour, and eating a bite of chicken liver and pig liver is equivalent to eating 100 kilograms or thousands of kilograms of flour. Food safety is a matter of great concern to everyone. No matter what the purpose of calling for and opposing the ban on benzoyl peroxide is, one thing is certain. As long as there is scientific evidence to prove that the use of benzoyl peroxide in flour is harmful to human health and destroys the nutrition of flour, the ban is correct. But in order to achieve the purpose of prohibition, it is irresponsible to fabricate lies and deceive the public. Some voices calling for the ban on flour brighteners, under the slogan of considering food safety for the public interest, are widely publicized through the news media, actually for their own commercial interests. In order to prove that flour brighteners are harmful, some people equate flour brighteners with "hanging white blocks" that are not food additives, confusing concepts. China's standard stipulates that the dosage of flour whitening agent in flour is 60mg/kg (really low, which is inconsistent with the actual needs), while the excessive dosage of flour whitening agent in some flour enterprises in China is mostly 60- 100mg/kg, which can be confirmed by online search. It can be said that the excessive use of flour whitening agent by some flour enterprises does not meet the requirements of Chinese standards, and there is no safety problem at all! The US FDA is an internationally recognized authority on food additives, and it is also the main target of food additive standards in many countries. The following are some scientific evidences about the safety of flour whitening agent (benzoyl peroxide): 1. The United States uses (1) benzoyl peroxide indefinitely in flour, which can be used as bleaching agent in wheat flour. (2) The dosage of benzoyl peroxide in wheat flour can be added according to the needs of normal production, and there is no maximum dosage limit (GMP). 2. The usage of flour whitening agent in Canada is 2.5 times that in China (1). Benzoyl peroxide can be added to wheat flour as a food additive for bleaching, ripening and dough improvement. (2) The maximum dosage of benzoyl peroxide in wheat flour is 150mg/kg. 3.CAC recently increased the dosage of flour whitening agent (benzoyl peroxide). In 2007, CAC issued the eighth edition of General Standard Code of Food Additives (CXS- 192), which officially listed benzoyl peroxide as a flour additive and increased the maximum dosage in flour from 66mg/kg to 75mg/kg. 4. Safety evaluation report of flour brightener Toxicological research was conducted by South Korea, and the Organization for International Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published a detailed toxicological test evaluation report of benzoyl peroxide (Siam 15 SIDNITAL evaluation report-Boston, USA, 20021October 22-25). The report discusses in detail that benzoyl peroxide is harmless to human body. There is a lot of evidence that flour brighteners are safe. At present, the harmful reports about flour brighteners in China can be said to be groundless. In addition, scientific tests have proved that flour whitening agent does not destroy the nutrition of flour at all, which is a well-verified ordinary test that can be verified by general provincial laboratory centers. At present, it is proved that flour brightener is a very safe food additive among many food additives, and its safety can be said to be impeccable, which some people who call for banning flour brightener did not expect. Looking at some reports about banning flour brighteners, there is no substantive scientific basis except some sensational words and inferences, and even the basic evaluation procedures and related safety evaluation indicators of food additives are not understood.