A ban and some questions

There has been little logic or clarity to the government’s actions around banning a popular brand of noodles, and now its unbanning by the Bombay High Court is unlikely to clear the air either. In June, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) said the snack, Maggi, was found to be “hazardous and unsafe for human consumption”. This followed from samples testing positive in some States for high levels of lead and monosodium glutamate (MSG), according to the FSSAI. Simultaneously, samples tested in other States came back with a certification of safety; Nestle, the manufacturer, said that 2,700 samples had been tested in India and abroad during the last few months and that all of them were found to have levels of lead far below the danger mark. The company maintains that it does not add MSG to its noodles. However, panic set in swiftly; the product went off the shelves across the country, partly in response to bans by individual States, and partly as a result of consumer fears. The High Court has now found that no opportunity was given to the company to prove its side before the ban was imposed, and that the tests were not conducted in accredited laboratories. While lifting the ban, it ordered further tests that follow proper norms. A class action suit against Nestle filed by the government before the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission remains in process.

These contradictory signals leave the consumer confused and unsure where to turn for authentic information. When taking on a powerful multinational, the FSSAI should have been equipped with the full facts before putting what now appears to be half-baked information into the public space. If the food regulator is unable to follow proper norms, the consumer is left with little confidence that it is properly regulating the manufacture and sale of thousands of other potentially harmful food products in the Indian market, ones that are particularly prone to adulteration. There is little standardisation in food testing procedures, and laboratories — there are already too few of them — may throw up wildly differing results. In such a situation, Indian consumers, particularly parents of little children, are often forced to look up whether a particular ingredient in permitted by food regulators in the United States or the United Kingdom, given the utter lack of proactive, reliable information from their own food regulator. Companies will meanwhile have grounds for grievance against the FSSAI for the loss of revenue and reputation they might unfairly suffer. If India intends to ensure stringent food norms, it will need to be armed with the facts. Unsubstantiated warnings that have to be rolled back in no time inspire confidence about them in neither the consumer nor the industry.