Experts praise FDA role in ensuring food safety

NAGPUR: It might have been only recently that the World Health Organisation has started focusing on food safety. Indian authorities, however, were among the first to identify problems as well as form regulations in this regard. In fact, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) guidelines inspired similar acts in the United States of America, said experts at a recent CME on food safety organized by city branch of Indian Medical Association (IMA). 

Deputy commissioner of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) SS Desai was the chief guest while faculty included Dr Mohan Khamgaonkar, Dr Sarita Ugemuge, Dr Abhijeet Deshmukh and food safety expert Prabodh Halde. 

"It is predicted that by 2020, India will become the world's kitchen. With diverse agro-climatic conditions, we can produce all kinds of food and are the foremost producers of milk, pulses and tea. With changing times, chemicals have entered food through products like nutraceuticals and health supplements. Considering all this, a need for an all-encompassing law was felt instead of one against adulteration only. So, FSSAI guidelines were made, replacing several older acts," informed Halde, who is also associated with Association of Food Scientists and Technologists. 

He said the rules were formulated so well that even United State of America (USA) took a leaf out of our book in the act that they adopted in 2012. He also praised the efforts of the state's FDA officials for conducting the highest number of inspections in the country. 

Desai gave more detailed information about the way FDA has worked since the act was implemented in 2011. "We have conducted numerous random inspections, sampled products at each stage of processing to identify wrong doers and acted against even the most reputed establishments in Nagpur division. Licenses have been suspended and products have been recalled too. Such stringent action has not happened anywhere else," he said. 

He also said in three years a lot of improvements have happened as FDA can now take action against offenders rather than only reporting them. "The offenders getting strict punishments has also ensured that the number of offences went down tremendously, " Desai said. 

Certain factors, like, how much pesticides are used in a farm or how a product is grown is out of our control, but we start tracing products as soon as they leave farms," said Desai.