Citizens should help to protect food safety

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to explain why having too much of one thing may deprive you of the chance to have some other things. But it may take time for people to realize the loss.

From the ongoing baby formula scandal, Chinese consumers can see clearly that by relying entirely on one or a few government agencies (and a few can be worse than just one) for protection, they may have sacrificed their chance to create more useful citizen-level protection for themselves.

The potential cost of relying too much on administrative force to regulate the market is heavy. At times, bureaucrats fail to deliver their service, just as what the quality inspection officials did (or rather didn't do) with the poisoned baby formula that inundated the Chinese market over the past few years.