It is an appeal to policy makers to make available safe food to our citizens

Bhopal, India

The food and Drug are the two commodities which are vulnerable for quality deterioration and may have life threatening effect if not regulated properly. Hence Government of India has established special regulatory bodies to take care of safety and standardisation on their manufacturing process.

In case Drug store or Medical shop or Pharmacists/Chemists the first requirement is to be a Pharmacist and second is getting approval/Registration/Certification from the CMO's office of that district. Followed by one should have a furnished shop.

With Similar concern for food government has established the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) for laying down science based standards for articles of food and to regulate their manufacture, storage, distribution, sale and import to ensure availability of safe and wholesome food for human consumption in India. FSSAI has been mandated with Registration of all Food Business Operators in India.

The authority aims to establish a single reference point for all matters relating to food safety and standards, by moving from multi- level, multi- departmental control to a single line of command. The FSSAI has been mandated for 1) Framing of Regulations to lay down the Standards and guidelines in relation to articles of food and specifying appropriate system of enforcing various standards thus notified, 2) Provide scientific advice and technical support to Central Government and State Governments in the matters of framing the policy and rules in areas which have a direct or indirect bearing of food safety and nutrition, 3) Collect and collate data regarding food consumption, incidence and prevalence of biological risk, contaminants in food, residues of various, contaminants in foods products, identification of emerging risks and introduction of rapid alert system, 4) Contribute to the development of international technical standards for food, sanitary and phyto-sanitary standards and 5) Promote general awareness about food safety and food standards.

In case of Drugs to implement all regulations to ensure safe drug manufacture and distribution has been possible mainly because they have a qualified person sitting each of their establishment small or big, however in case food that is not the case. The food production and distribution is being handled even at commercial level by non qualified staff though they may have experience is the field. The major bottleneck in making our food items competitive in international market as well as protect their quality for domestic consumer is not achieved just because we do not have trained food professionals working or managing this business.

Hence if quality of Indian food to be made as per standards and ensure its safety it should be made mandatory for Food Business Operators to employ based on their level of operation one or more for professionals either diploma or degree holders either in food science/food technology or food engineering who will guide the food business operator on the overall hygiene in the establishment, ensure proper check on quality of inputs used and proper packaging and storage of raw as well as finished products. These employees will also facilitate the FSSAI rules and regulations implementation in the food processing/manufacturing or distribution establishment more effectively.

Hence I appeal that to make FSSAI to be more effective we need to make mandatory for employment of trained food professional similar to drug store where pharmacist can only own and operate the drug store. In case of food we do not advocate that owner should be trained food technologist but in his establishment he should have one or more trained persons based on volume of the business.