FSSAI asks food business operators to gear up for rigorous inspection regime

New Delhi, Dec 13 () Food regulator FSSAI will launch "rigorous" inspections on food companies to ensure that best standards are followed as part of its effort to build trust among people about the safety and quality of cooked or packaged products, its CEO Pawan Kumar Agarwal said Thursday.

The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) will also conduct surveys on many food products being sold in the market to check quality, he said, adding a survey on milk and dairy products has recently been done.

"Our mandate is to ensure availability of safe and wholesome food for human consumption. We have taken initiative in last few years to create demand for such foods. Businesses will make it available only if consumer demands," Agarwal said at a CII conference on Food Safety, Quality and Regulatory summit here.

However, he said an average, Indian citizen is still not confident about safety of packaged or cooked food. "We need to do something to bring trust among people".

Agarwal highlighted various initiatives being taken to create visibility of FSSAI, develop new ecosystem for training/audit of food safety officers, strengthen testing labs and energise state enforcing agencies.

Now, he said the FSSAI would focus on creating a "culture of self-compliances" for food businesses as well as for labs and audit agencies.

"Food businesses now have to be geared up for rigorous inspection regime," Agarwal said, adding that regulator through this inspection would verify whether food companies are complying with standards laid by it.

"We will also conduct surveys and huge surveillance to find out risk. We need to find problem area and make efforts to fix it, then only people's trust can be build," he said. The surveys and surveillance effort would help in generating robust data for the regulator.

Agarwal informed that the government has recently permitted creation of about 800 posts in the authority, but still the strength would be lower than many other countries.Therefore, he said, the FSSAI is making efforts to create network of partnerships with scientific, research and academic institutions to fulfil its mandate.

HC wants permissible formaldehyde limit finalised

Panaji: The high court of Bombay at Goa on Thursday asked the 11-member scientific panel of fish and fisheries products of the food safety and standards authority of India (FSSAI) to go ahead and finalise the permissible limit of naturally occurring formaldehyde in species of fish to clear the existing ambiguity.

The court further gave the government a time frame of three months to place on record a progress report on the same. 

Till then, justice R M Borde observed, an adhoc limits of 4mg/kg of formaldehyde for fresh water origin fish and 100mg/kg for brackish/marine origin fish will prevail for all practical purposes.

He told the petitioners that proper procedure would be followed where they can raise objections and suggestions, before the finalised limit is placed before the parliament to be incorporated in a law.

Advocate Dharmesh Verenkar, who represented the FSSAI, told the court that once the scientific panel decides on naturally occurring formaldehyde in fish, the issue will be forwarded to the scientific committee, which if agreeable, can recommend this for the legislature to decide and frame regulations.

In an earlier affidavit, FSSAI had stated that in order to clear the ambiguity associated with naturally occurring formaldehyde, the panel would have to undertake a nearly two-year-long research project.

Fungus in chilli powder: FSDA notice to grocery store

Bareilly: The Food Safety and Drugs Administration (FSDA) has slapped a notice on a grocery store after laboratory test report said chilli powder collected from the establishment located in Nawabganj contained moulds and fungus. 

According to officials, a team of FSDA had collected samples of chilli powder from the store on August 24, 2018. The laboratory report, which arrived on Tuesday, stated the presence of moulds and fungus in the chilli powder which was put up for sale. The adulterated chilli powder is harmful for health if consumed by humans, the report stated.

Dharam Raj Mishra, district designated officer, FSDA, said, “Following the laboratory report, we have served notice to Shirajuddin grocery store located in Meerganj sub-division on Wednesday. We have sought a reply from the store owner in 30 days. If the reply is not found satisfactory, the matter will be taken up in the court of additional chief judicial magistrate. If the accused is found guilty, he can be awarded a prison term of six months or a fine of up to Rs 5 lakh.”

74% of Mumbai eateries have dirty kitchens: FDA

MUMBAI: A peek into kitchens of some of the city’s top restaurants has thrown some extremely unappetising findings. In a special drive, where 500 popular restaurants were surveyed, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) officials found hygiene and food safety violations in more than 74%.

A swanky café in Kala Ghoda, an iconic kebab place in Colaba, a renowned Mughlai food chain, a famous vegetarian chain with outlets dotting the highways, were among 327 restaurants in the city served improvement notices by FDA. Overall, 3,047 top restaurants were inspected across Maharashtra, of which a staggering 87% lacked cleanliness, sanitation, air quality, ventilation, food packaging and safe distribution.

A significant majority had also ignored mandatory health checks of staff. Centre for Disease Control (CDC) says that sick employees can contaminate food and give rise to health concerns. 

About a year ago, around 240 food safety officers were directed to make a list of the best 20 restaurants in their zones and start inspecting them. “The results are mind-boggling. We found health and hygiene concerns in almost every step of food preparation and distribution. Unfortunately, some renowned restaurants, which families have been frequenting for decades, had very untidy kitchens,” said FDA commissioner Pallavi Darade. She said the exercise began a year back and will continue till over 4000 restaurants are inspected in Maharashtra. “It underlines that restaurants with classy interiors may not have clean kitchens,” she said.

Elaborating on hygiene and sanitary violations found in the city eateries, an FDA official said several did not clean their kitchens regularly even though it’s meant to be done daily as part of good sanitary practices. Many had not refurbished their kitchens in a long time, leading to chipping of walls and ceilings, which could also contaminate food. Many did not have insect- or pest-proof mesh fittings. “Food Safety and Standards Act has very clear guidelines on provision of clean bathrooms for staff. But many had filthy facilities, which raised doubts on whether staff could wash hands properly before preparing, packing or serving food,” said the official. 

FDA joint commissioner Shailesh Adhao said violations at more than 90% Mumbai restaurants were not so critical. “We have given everyone time to comply and many have started sending compliance reports. We will reinspect premises, and if sanitary violations remain, we will suspend or cancel licences,” he said. FDA has kept the names of restaurants under wraps till all file compliance reports.

Darade said consumers too must shoulder responsibility of keeping an eye on hygiene and insist on checking kitchens of restaurants they frequent. “We are bringing in a system of rating,” she said.

FDA asks Maganlal Chikki to suspend production, sale

The Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has slapped a notice on Lonavla-based chikki manufacturer Maganlal Chikki, asking it to stop the production for alleged violation of Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006 (FSSA) at its plants.

Lonavla in Pune district is a hub of production of chikki, a popular confection mainly made from groundnut.

An FDA official said Thursday that raids at Maganlal Chikki's plants found that the company was not complying with food safety norms.

"We found the company neither has its own laboratory to test the food items nor was it getting the products tested at NABL, a lab approved by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI)," said FDA joint commissioner Suresh Deshmukh.

The company also did not have an expert person for supervising the production, he claimed.

"It was also found that conditions at the plant were unhygienic, so we served them a notice to stop the production and sale of food items," he said.

Until the company complies with the norms it will not be able to restart the production, he said.

When contacted, owner of Maganlal Chikki, Ashok Agarwal, said the notice was of "technical nature" and had nothing to do with the quality of its food products.

"We have already started complying with all the norms and we are sure the production will restart soon," he said.