Water standards are not a business secret

The quality of bottled drinking water is a major public concern, says an article in Beijing News (excerpts below).

As the quality of bottled water directly relates to consumer safety, standards for its testing must always be transparent and can never hide behind commercial confidentiality.

Information that the general public is entitled to know should never be classified as a secret.

According to regulations in China, when there is no national or industrial standard, the companies' standards should be disclosed to the local authority, which means there is no confidentiality.

Regretfully, this has not happened. It may be that some companies are "embarrassed" by their formulas for bottled water and don't want rivals or the public to know. But this issue is too serious for such concerns.