China's food safety authority issued a circular on Thursday requiring food safety watchdogs across the country to beef up supervision amid the approaching New Year's holiday and China's Spring Festival.

According to the circular issued by the State Council Food Safety Commission, food safety supervisors should step up inspections and screen out potential hazards in order to ensure people's health and safety during the holidays.

Holiday inspections should join ongoing campaigns launched to crackdown on the abuse of food additives such as clenbuterol, widely known as "lean meat powder," and recycled cooking oil, the circular read.

The circular also listed areas most prone to food safety risks, such as supermarkets, bazaars, school cafeterias, restaurants, tourist sites, as well as greasy spoons, butcher houses and make-shift food processing sites.

Several food safety scandals rattled the nation in 2011, including meat processors adding cancer-causing clenbuterol into pork feed to produce lean meat and restaurants serving food cooked with recycled oil known as "gutter oil."

China's Spring Festival, or the Lunar New Year, the important holiday of family reunion in the nation, falls on January 23 next year.

(Xinhua News Agency December 22, 2011)