TOKYO, JAPAN - Japan's foreign minister expressed hope on Friday that damage to ties with China could be minimised from a food scare sparked this week after 10 people fell ill after eating Chinese-made dumplings contaminated with pesticide.

The poison dumpling episode prompted floods of Japanese media coverage and a nationwide food scare, with hundreds of people complaining they had fallen ill after eating similar products.

No fresh cases, however, have been confirmed.

"It is possible that there could be a negative effect," Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura told a news conference.

"I think the negative impact can be minimised if the two countries cooperate with each other and take proper steps to find the cause and prevent a reoccurance."

Chief Cabinet Minister Nobutaka Machimura, who had previously suggested China was lax about food safety, said he thought Beijing was taking the incident seriously.

"China's response has been very speedy. It's stopped production and started inspections. I think we can say that with the Olympics coming up, they're concerned about such incidents," Machimura told a separate news conference.

"Is it sufficient? I don't know, but they are reSponding with a great deal of awareness of the problem," he added.

Relations between China and Japan are at the best of times sensitive, dogged by bitter wartime memories in China and present-day military and economic rivalry.

But ties have improved ever since an ice-breaking visit to Beijing in 2006 by then-prime minister Shinzo Abe.

Incumbent Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda, who favours close ties with Japan's Asian neighbours, is keen to preserve the warming trend ahead of an April visit by Chinese President Hu Jintao.

Japan Tobacco Inc said on Wednesday its subsidiary, JT Foods Co., would recall the frozen dumplings and other food made at the same Chinese factory. Other firms quickly followed suit, while restaurants and schools pulled the products from their menus.

The food scare is the latest in a string of disputes over the safety of Chinese products from toys to toothpaste.

Last month, China declared that its campaign to ensure food and product safety had been a complete success, but powerful Vice Premier Wu Yi later warned against complacency, saying China's regulatory system and industry were still underdeveloped.

Japanese media, meanwhile, criticised their own officials for responding too slowly to the incidents, which come just as Fukuda -- his popularity ratings sagging from doubts over his leadership -- has promised to be more sensitive to consumers' needs.

The criticism prodded Health Minister Yoichi Masuzoe to promise to tighten up procedures for reporting food poisoning.

"If we had grasped the situation sooner, later problems might not have occurred," Masuzoe told reporters.

"To prevent the spread of harm is our biggest objective, so reflecting on that, we will fix what needs to be improved.