Beijing ? Premier Wen Jiabao promised Saturday to improve Chinese food safety, seeking to tamp down public anxiety in the widening scandal over tainted milk that has sickened more than 50,000 children.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in the port of Tianjin, Wen did not announce new initiatives but he said the government would work to instill business ethics in light of the milk contamination and a string of earlier product safety disasters.

“We plan not only to revitalize the food industry and the milk powder industry, we will try to ensure that all China-made products are safe for consumers and consumers can buy with assurance,” he said.

Even before the uproar over contaminated milk, China’s manufacturing industry had been under intense scrutiny after the industrial chemical melamine and other industrial toxins were found last year in exports ranging from toothpaste to a pet food ingredient.

Four deaths have been blamed on the bad milk and some 54,000 children have developed kidney stones or other illnesses after drinking tainted baby formula.