Producer faces challenges investigating fabrication of red pepper powder

Producer Jang Shi-won looked tired when this reporter met him at the resting room on the third floor at Dong-A Media Center in Seoul on Thursday. He said he could not afford to have goodnight sleep until Friday night, when the episode “Red pepper powder” will be aired on “Food X-File,” a popular investigative reporting show on Channel A, a sister cable TV channel of The Dong-A Ilbo. Investigating and gathering news to produce the episode “Red pepper powder,” Jang experienced quite a bit of inconveniences.

The project started in July, after Jang received a whistleblowing phone call, while preparing to produce “Good Eatery Camp.” The informant said, “Many suppliers use mixed red pepper powder that is made by processing wet red pepper imported from China. If you cannot trust me, boil red pepper powder in water with tofu, and you will see the color of tofu change into red.” Getting suspicious, Jang bought red pepper powder and boil it in water with tofu. Tofu weirdly changed its color into reddish as if a processed product dyed in red. Jang immediately referred the red pepper powder to a research institute to analyze its ingredients.

“Wet red pepper powder lacks red pepper contents, and hence factories in Korea often add red pepper, and edible red pigment. The difficult part is that it is hard to tell with naked eyes red pepper powder made in such way from ordinary red pepper powders. It was very difficult for us to investigate and gather news, because even a farmer who cultivated red pepper for 30 years, a chef, and a merchant who engaged in red pepper sales for 30 years, can hardly tell it from ordinary ones.”

Waiting for results of analysis from the research institute, Jang could hardly endure anxiety and stress. While on-site investigation and news gathering were underway, he became anxious due to lack of critical evidence. The research center said, “To ensure accuracy, we will conduct analysis once again.”

“Because red pepper powder is so widely used that the think tank seemed to be trying to reduce burden from possible fallacy in analysis,” Jang said. After waiting for about a month, Jang heard the answer “Edible red pigment was detected,” and jumped out of joy.

Then one day, Jang received an urgent text message on his mobile phone, reading, “I am currently surrounded by workers,” when he was gathering news in Yeongyang, North Gyeongsang Province. The sender of the message of a rookie producer, who went to a company producing “red pepper powder” imported from China. While trying to sneak into the factory, he was caught by a Chinese worker. “I pushed the call button immediately, but could not reach him for an hour. All different ominous thoughts came to my mind for the 60 minutes. Why did I send the novice to the site? I should have gone there by myself….”

The junior colleague returned call an hour later. He said he was ripped off all video tapes he filmed at the site. Producer Jang said he reflected on himself, who was standing in front of “Doors to the truth” countless times from the time when he was serving as producer for MBC TV’s “PD’s Diary,” to this date. “If you use good rhetoric, I go out to find the truth, but I always feel nervous and get anxious. This would be the same regardless of whether you only have two-year experience or 30 years. I pledged to myself that I will never again let my assistant producer visit a dangerous place alone.”

Like the red heart that shivers in front of the door to truth, Jang’s trauma has now shifted back to the red eatery. “I feel wary of eating reddish food. The toughest part of all that I experience producing this program is that I should constantly suspect and feel sense of betrayals. You know the sense of betrayal you would feel when you realize who you believed was a true love proved not to be as such. This is exactly what you feel when you encounter the hidden truth behind food you consume every day.”