Picking the right food

In a bid to make consumers aware about whether or not a restaurant complies with hygiene regulations, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has introduced a new measure. The government agency will soon ask restaurants and hotels to display their hygiene ratings on their doors or entrances. This comes against the backdrop of an increased number of diners wanting to go out and eat across cities in India. Eating out or meeting friends or family over meals in restaurants is a trend that has caught on now like never before, especially after an increasing number of signups on food aggregators.

There will also be food supervisors to check the safety of what is served, for which the regulator intends to train around 170,000 people. The FSSAI is in the process of forming guidelines to implement the rating system.

If implemented diligently, the programme would be in the interest of the customer and could raise the quality of food served. Ratings will give restaurant owners an incentive to improve their standards and will likely filter out food joints that pose a health risk. That extra costs borne to maintain quality may raise menu prices, too. The additional costs of raising food quality and maintaining it may also result in an increase in food prices. In cases where restaurants are found to be flouting rules of food safety, FSSAI will reportedly send notices. This move is part of a series of changes that the FSSAI is bringing as a part of its 'Eat Right Campaign'. The campaign involves measures aimed at preventive healthcare through checks and regulations, as well as awareness efforts and moves for food building capacity for restaurants. In general, few can object to such an idea.

However, any system that requires an external assessment of quality could be abused. As those in the hospitality business would testify, state-directed scrutiny tends to descend all too easily into an “inspector raj", with officials determined to give them a hard time, unless given some reason—pecuniary or otherwise—not to. As a way to guard against this, the criteria for hygiene ratings will need to be clear-cut and uniformly applicable, with no scope for subjectivity. A lot of well-intended initiatives end up hurting a market simply because their execution is faulty.

The move appears to be a well-intended and timely one, given an increasing interest in dine-in restaurants and thousands of new restaurants cropping up around the country week after week. However, it remains to be seen how it will be implemented.