Jun 22, 2016

FSSAI proposes to relax norms for carbonated drinks

Notification comes more than a year after PM Modi asked cola giants to add fruit juices to their drinks to help Indian farmers
Food safety regulator FSSAI has proposed to relax norms for carbonated drinks with fruit juices allowing lesser content of the latter in a bid to encourage beverage companies to mix juices in their products.
Seeking comments from stakeholders, FSSAI said in a draft notification that "in case the quantity of fruit juice is below 10% but not less than 5% (2.5% in case of lime or lemon), the product shall be called 'carbonated beverage with fruit juice'."
In such cases the requirement of TSS (Total Soluble Solids) shall not apply and the quantity of fruit juice shall be declared on the label, Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) said.
Indian Beverages Association wanted the minimum requirement for 10% of total soluble solids in carbonatedfruit drinks to be revised to 3%.
TSS is considered as a measure of quality of fruit juice with higher the better, subject to low presence of addedsugar and limited quantity of other thickening agents.
The notification by FSSAI comes more than a year after Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked multinational colagiants to add fruit juices to their drinks to help Indian farmers increase sales.
However, beverage makers wanted relaxation of conditions such as the minimum 10% fruit juice or pulp requirement in carbonated beverages with fruit juices and 5% in case of lemon.
Earlier this year, Coca Cola responded positively to the Prime Minister's call with the announcement of new 'juice with fizz' drink.

Spooked by bromate in bread? Check these 10 deadly pesticides on your plate

Issues so far
  • FSSAI has been very lackadaisical about dealing with pesticides in food
  • Despite being prodded many times, they have done almost nothing about it
Dangers
  • A list of 31 pesticides have been made by 25 labs across the country
  • All the 31 chemicals in the list can prove to be fatal to humans on prolonged consumption
More in the story
  • Ten chemicals out of the list of 31 and where they are found
  • How can the government be made to pay attention
It took nearly a month for FSSAI (Food Safety and Standards Authority of India) to announce a ban on a carcinogen - Potassium Bromate - that was found in bread samples by a study.
But considering how FSSAI has fared otherwise, this has to be counted among its crowning achievements.
Take the case of pesticide contamination in food crops, for instance. A long pending crisis about which the regulator has been reminded by none other than Supreme Court and NHRC. Despite repeated prodding, it still remains as an issue in which the regulator has done nothing really.
Consuming pesticide-laced food, an expert talking about this issue joked, is an everyday crime of trespassing. That is if you consider your body as private property and the cache of pesticides that enter your body with food - as intruders.
On a more serious note, the expert said that government's willful ignorance of harmful pesticides being used in the fields is an everyday violation of our right to safe food or a safe food-chain.
According to government's own report, published recently, a fifth of all foods produced and sold in the country contain pesticide residues.
This data was reported by a Union agriculture ministry-sponsored nationwide network project involving 25 participating labs.
Catch has in its possession a list of 31 extremely harmful pesticides that have been almost universally banned but are being used indiscriminately in India.
To give you an idea we list 10 of those 31 pesticides here:
Phosphamidon
Used in foodgrains, milled foodgrains, fruits and vegetables.
World Health Organisation (WHO) has classified this pesticide as 'extremely hazardous', United States' Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has classified it as 'Category 1 (highly toxic)' and according to European Union standards it is 'very toxic' and 'dangerous to environment'.
Studies have shown exposure to this compound affects the central nervous system, producing incoordination, slurred speech, loss of reflexes, involuntary muscle contractions, eventually leading to paralysis of the body extremities and the respiratory muscles.
Over exposure to this pesticide can also cause psychosis, irregular heartbeat, unconsciousness, convulsions, respiratory failure, cardiac arrest and coma.
Monocrotophos
Used in food grains, fruits and vegetables.
On 16 July, 2013, 23 school children died in Bihar after consuming their mid-day meal that was contaminated by this chemical. Despite this tragedy this pesticide continues to be used in our fields.
Monocrotophos is classified by WHO as a 'highly hazardous' chemical. Severe exposure to this chemical is known to cause involuntary defecation or urination, psychosis, irregular heartbeat, unconsciousness, convulsions and coma.
Acephate
It is used mostly in rice and sunflower seeds. It is considered to be a fetotoxin (a chemical compound that can poison the fetus) and there is evidence of Acephate exposure causing hormonal imbalance.
Alachlor
It is used in ground nuts, maize and soyabean seeds.
Tests on lab rats have shown repeated exposure of Alachlor to cause hepato-toxicity, irreversible eye degeneration and tumor formation.
Carbaryl
Used in food grains, okra and leafy vegetables.
Tests have shown that Carbaryl affects the nervous system.
Carbofuran
Used in food grains, fruits, oil seeds, sugarcane, vegetables and tea.
Exposure to this chemical is known to cause nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps, sweating, diarrhea, excessive salivation, weakness, imbalance, blurring of vision, breathing difficulty, increased blood pressure, and incontinence.
Consuming a large dose of Carbufuran can cause death from respiratory system failure.
Dicofol
Used in fruits, vegetables, tea, chilli and sorghum. I
Dicofol is known to be an irritant and neurotoxin to mammals and has tendency to accumulate in the body.
Ethion
Used in gram, pigeon tea, soybean seeds, tea, chilli and fruits.
The chemical is known to cause nervous disorders.
Oxydemetonmethyl
Used in chilli, mustard oil and food grains.
Exposure to this chemical is known to cause complications like excessive sweating, salivation and lachrimation, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, abdominal cramps, general weakness, headache, poor concentration and tremors.
A bigger dose of this compound can also cause death by respiratory failure.
Zineb
Used in fruits and vegetable crops.
Zineb has been proved to be harmful to the thyroid, liver and muscles.
These pesticides have not gone out of circulation despite repeated incidents of deaths caused by consumption.
In fact Supreme Court of India held FSSAI responsible for food contamination by pesticides and issued them a notice in 2013.
Two years later, in December 2014, the NHRC (National Human Rights Commission) issued a notice to them after taking cognisance of a report according to which the maximum residual levels of pesticides in fruits and vegetables had been exceeded by many times in several samples taken up for testing.
To give an instance of how flippant and selfish our law makers are in dealing with this crisis, Gopal Krishna, Director, ToxicsWatch, shares an anecdote.
"Back early 2000s when the Coca Cola and other soft drinks were shown to contain pesticide residues a Joint Parliamentary Committee was constituted to look into its effects. The result was that while no regulations were placed on the soft drink companies or on pesticide firms, the committee, horrified by the toxic levels of pesticides it found in their samples, banned soft drinks in the Parliament," Krishna shares.
All that the government has done so far, Krishna says, is to have set up committees to look into the use of pesticides.
All that the government has done to battle pesticides is set up committees
"One committee is constituted to look into the issue of food contamination by pesticides, and another committee is constituted to verify the findings of the previous committee and so it goes."
Satish Sinha, associate director at Toxics Link, says that the issue of food contamination by pesticides is "very serious" but the problem cannot be resolved quickly because India has not come up with, or publicised a list of pesticides which it considers harmful nor has it banned any of them.
"We know these chemicals are always coming up in our food. But there's no regulation of pesticides in the country. We need to find out who are producing these pesticides. Who is importing them, if they are not being produced locally and how are farmers getting their hands on them," says Sinha.
One way to have these chemicals banned in the country, Krishna proposes, is to have parliamentarians check their own blood for them. This is perhaps the only way to shake our law makers out of their slumber.
"There is a test available in the market called body burden test. The results of these test shows a person all the poisonous chemicals in their blood stream, and these chemicals can be traced back to their source. Let our parliamentarians conduct a body burden test on themselves for these 31 pesticides and we'll see how speedily they'll impose regulations for the rest of us lesser mortals," says Krishna.
In the meanwhile, a detailed set of questions have been sent to the FSSAI by Catch News on 15 June regarding these pesticides and we are currently awaiting their response,

Advts with false health claims under scrutiny

NEW DELHI : India’s food regulator, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), has finally cracked the whip on at least four companies that were making false claims of their products in the misleading advertisements as the best for health. The companies were forced to either withdraw their advertisements or modify them.
These firms included Jivo Wellness Private Ltd that was advertising that Canola oil can prevent diabetes and heart diseases with a private hospital putting its seal, while the KC Foods from Jammu and Kashmir was advertising its digestive biscuits as the best in the market due to the highest content of whole wheat flour.
The firms pulled up include Chemical resources in Maharashtra for the Furocycst pills meant for ovarian cysts. It was making claims that the drug contents the US-patented ingredients with no side-effects and that 94% of patients reported positive results. The apex food regulator took action after receiving a complaint from the GAMA (Grievances against Misleading Advertisements), a web portal launched by the Department of Consumer Affairs last year.
Only recently, the FSSAI asked its central licensing authority to send a show-cause notice to Yoga guru Ramdev’s Patanjali group over complaints of misleading advertisements on mustard oil it sells.
Analysts say misleading advertisements are notoriously common in India and easy to get away with. FSSAI has approached the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), a private institution, to join forces with it to clamp down on false food and beverages commercials.

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FSSAI finalises list of 11,000 food additives

Removes potassium bromate, cyclamates from the list
NEW DELHI, JUNE 21: 
The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), which was in the process of harmonising Indian food standards with the international CODEX standards, has now finalised a list of 11,000 permissible food additives.
Industry players believe this will ease the way for new product launches in the country, which is a longstanding grievance of the industry. In a statement, the food regulator said, “With this, the FSSAI has achieved a major land mark in setting of the standards for various foods in the country.”
Industry players believe this will help strengthen the position of India as a global hub for food processing industry and help move the industry to ingredient-based regime.
In addition, the FSSAI said that it removed potassium bromate, which is used in bread and bakery products and cyclamates, which is used in jams, jellies, marmalades, dairy-based drinks and confectionary, from the list of permissible additives. The bread manufacturers association had earlier voluntarily decided to withdraw the use of potassium bromate.
The draft of these standards was released for public consultation in October last year. About 8,000 food additives were operationalised in December, and now it has been updated to standards for 11,000 food additives.
“The FSSAI has convened a meeting of the Scientific Committee…to discuss other issues which have been received with respect to additives after these were finalised. The committee will also discuss the issue of use of potassium iodate in the food in the country,” the statement added.