Spices board workshop to focus on food safety

The Spices Board and World Spice Organisation are jointly organising a one-day workshop on ‘Food safety' with special reference to spices in Kochi on February 29. The workshop will focus on highlighting the concept of food safety, an issue of concern in the present context along with the need to comply with the terms and conditions of various food safety acts. 

Strict regulations for food safety and standards have been put in place from August 5, 2011. Spices Board and World Spice Organisation through this campaign would offer a platform for the public to gain insights into the great challenges of this issue. 

Mr Udai K Saxena, Joint Secretary of the Association of Food Scientists and Technologists, India, and a member of FSSA Committee of experts on categorisation of food products codes will lead the discussions for the day. 

To ensure availability of safe and wholesome food for human consumption, the Food Safety and Standard Act of 2006 has to be carried out with no compromise. The workshop will discuss provision and overview of FSSA 2006 and basic concept of food safety and hygiene with specific reference to the spice industry. Registration and Licensing regulations, general hygiene requirements for it and procedure of new and renewal of license are topics that will be discussed. The workshop will also confer packaging and labelling regulations especially for spices and laboratory and sampling analysis that determine food safety standards. 

Deliberations on food safety and standards for the workshop are expected to bring awareness on the subject and will be beneficial to the participants mainly farmers, traders and exporters, a press release issued here said.

Public views sought on food safety Act

The Food Safety and Standards Authority (FSSA) will soon be publishing all the standards stipulated in the Food Safety and Standards Act 2006, for public knowledge, and suggestions can be forwarded to the Authority for consideration.

Eight scientific panels, one scientific committee and 120 scientists would process them, said Mr V. Gaur, Chief Executive Officer, FSSA, here recently.

Addressing an awareness meeting on ‘Food Safety and Standards Act', organised by the Madurai District Tiny and Small-Scale Industries Association (Maditssia), Mr Gaur said that the philosophy of the authority is to take stakeholders along. . Tracing the genesis of the Act, culminating ina single uniform Act for the country for the first time, he said that the journey has just started as the law is yet to be implemented and only the structural edifice is being built up. The training programme is on for officials in charge of implementation. . As suggestions are considered, changes would be effected but the course is a time-bound process and amendments to the law haveto be through Parliament, he added.

Earlier, Mr S.P. Jeyaprakasam, President, Tamil Nadu Foodgrains Merchants Association and Mr K.R. Gnanasambandan, Vice-President, Tamil Nadu Small and Tiny Industries Association, expressed their apprehensions about the law under implementation.