How does Indian food safety vigilance compare with that of USA?

If number of violations and indictments for the same in the food safety area is compared between the US and India, probably we may get some solace that this country is in a better position, especially if health damages from such foods are kept in view. But scratching the surface further, we can realize that such solace is totally out of place because of massive deficiencies in our data base and relatively tough "bellies" Indians have, practically immune to many infectious food borne pathogens. There are neither regular inspections, nor massive product calls nor fast indictment of violators in our country. Can we say with any degree of confidence that any food or water consumed in our country is safe as measured by international standards? Take for example our water supply systems in metro areas. There is no city or town in the country which can assure its citizens that its so called protected water delivery system can pass the safety test where as in a country like the US even water from a toilet tap is relatively safe! Recently there has been some move by the law makers in the US to bring about further improvements in the safety vigilance system there which is commendable. Here is a take on this new initiatives being attempted to overhaul the food inspection machinery that is operating in that country.

"U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is asking the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to increase the number of food facility inspections it performs and deal out greater fines to facilities found to have unsanitary conditions. He also called for an "easily accessible, real-time" source of information for restaurants and consumers who want to know about the conditions of the facilities that produce or warehouse their food.According to a press release from Schumer's office on Monday, in 2014, FDA cited more than 90 food warehouses and other facilities around the country for unsanitary conditions, including rat infestations. Food from those facilities could pose a public health threat, Schumer said. The press release cited a number of examples of facilities that received warnings, including a Brooklyn-based food warehouse containing rodent carcasses and feces, as well as insects at a rice producer and dead mice and rats at a cookie-production facility.FDA currently inspects "high risk" food facilities once every three years, while other facilities are inspected even less often. Even facilities with minor problems should be inspected more often than once every three years, he said.
Schumer outlined a three-part plan he feels would rectify seemingly widespread problems with food facility sanitation:
    1. More inspections. Any facility with problems that merit a warning letter from FDA should be immediately categorized as "high risk." FDA should also increase the number of inspections for high-risk facilities. When facilities provide evidence that they are no longer high risk, they return to a lower classification.
    2. Searchable database of problematic facilities. Restaurants and consumers need a clearer way to tell whether or not they're receiving food from clean facilities. "The FDA should provide an easy to find, search and navigate database of these facilities and their violations on their website or through another forum FDA believes can most effectively inform consumers," the press release stated.
    3. Increased penalties for violations. For fiscal year 2015, the fees associated with re-inspections of problematic facilities were estimated at $217 per hour. That's not a heavy enough fine to encourage strict compliance with food safety regulations, Schumer said."

What is very interesting is the relatively high level of awareness about the problems of consumers vis-a-vis food safety among the law makers and the extent of their involvement in consumer protection programs of the country. In contrast our law makers, if we go by their standards of behavior in the Lok Sabha or Rajya Sabha or state legislatures, have no time for any thing but shouting, demonstrations, personal fights and many non-issues of total irrelevance to the needs of the citizen. Bills are enacted into law with hardly any discussions and implementation details are rarely worked out. To day's Food Security Act is nothing but a sham, "managed" wholly by the hardened bureaucrats with very little commitment or honest objective. In a country of scarcities in every food category and high prices, probably people may have to build dedicated temples for the "Food God" to protect them from food fraudsters and criminals with very little concern or value for the lives of ordinary people and offer prayers regularly!

V.H.POTTY

http://vhpotty.blogspot.com

http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

FOOD QUALITY MONITORING-THE AWESOME TASK!

India is a large country with 1.2 billion plus population with diverse culture and economic standards. Any thing to be done on a pan-India scale is fraught with insurmountable problems and only dedication, commitment, perseverance and high investment can show positive result at the ground level. In spite of good intentions and massive investments, the income gap between the rich and the poor is widening and poor people in the country are increasingly being mired in endless miseries and agony which do not seem to give them much hope about their future. Food is an area where the country has done reasonably well, at least with regard to production of staple grains like wheat and rice. Of course the story of oil seeds and pulses is one of many missed opportunities and billions of rupees are being spent to bring these foods from out side the country every year. The onus on the government to protect the food supply is indeed awesome and the special purpose vehicle created for the country's food safety is still in its formative stage trying to prove its mettle during the last 5 years. Unfortunately this outfit under the name Food Standards and Safety Authority (FSSAI) has been created with a heavy bureaucratic structure with doubtful capability for showing any dynamism at the ground level. As this agency is heavily dependent on the state governments with no authority to enforce its writ, the policies often do not get implemented. Here is a take on this important area of concern to the Indian citizen, viz how food is the food taken by him!

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The agency is working to bring on board about 55 million people engaged in various food businesses and register them with the organisation by February 2014, Chandramouli said. Currently, only one million licences have been issued to food and beverage operators. To check and maintain food standards, FSSAI is in the process of setting up testing laboratories, he said. "Our aim is to have at least one laboratory in each state initially. Later, we plan it to increase this to at least one lab for every 20 districts in the next five years," he added. There are currently 72 government laboratories, which are to be upgraded during this period. Simultaneously, 33 new such testing centres will be set up. On food imports, Chandramouli said: "Our country imports lot of food items now. Though there is no fixed figure available, but Rs2-3 lakh crore of foods come to India every year." "We don't have food and safety standards in the country which deal with food products across the spectrum. For this, we need to get the state governments and other stakeholders on board," Chandramouli said, adding implementation of the FSSAI Act continues to remain a challenge".

The above report laments about lack of allocation of funds to FSSAI during the 12th Plan and one is afraid that this could as well become an excuse for non-performance or under performance.It is common knowledge that the quality of food made in India and imported at great cost is suspect because of grossly under developed infrastructure and shortage of critical personnel to run the monitoring program sincerely and effectively. With legal system delaying trials of food fraudsters for years, many are able to get away with blatant violations of existing laws and wide spread adulteration.  One of the excuses trotted out for under performance is lack of standards available to enforce but this argument cannot be sustained when it is realized that international standards under FAO-WHO as well by different global organizations are in place for thousands of foods which can easily be adopted till domestic-specific ones are evolved. FSSAI seems to be over obsessed with licensing and wants more than 55 million food handlers to be brought into its licensing system! Is it practical? What next after registration? Does it have adequate capability to undertake surveillance of these players regularly? Millions of home scale processors, cottage units and micro enterprises cannot be expected to register with FSSAI which is both time consuming and cumbersome. Since the retailers who sell the food articles are all licensed by local civic authorities, it is easier to make them accountable vis-a-vis quality of food sold by them. The onus of selling safe food must be put on these retailers who must be punished if he peddles bad food even unintentionally. Such an environment will starve the fraudsters of a market eventually. No doubt a body like FSSAI is a necessity for the country but it must be made to work hard and diligently for the welfare of the common man.  

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

PRODUCT RECALL REGIME-LATEST "JOKE" FROM FSSAI!

If meetings and press notes are an indication of the effectiveness of functioning of an organization, the FSSAI at Delhi must be the most admired food safety agency in the world! Though India is known to be the world capital of sub-standard, adulterated and unsafe foods in this planet, precious little is done by GOI during the last 5 decades except setting up a paper tiger called by the exalted name-"The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India" (FSSAI) supposed to take up the onus of safeguarding the interests of 1.2 billion citizens in the country. The state machinery on which FSSAI depends for carrying out vigilance against unsafe foods are hardly functioning while convictions for food related crimes are insignificant due to non-performance of the safety auditing by the national as well as state systems. Here comes another "Press Note" with a grand declaration that a product recall system would be introduced in the country soon! Who will do this is the million dollar question and such grandstand with no track record to back up, hardly inspires any confidence among the citizens that India is a country for safe foods! 

"The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) recently held a Product Recall Pilot meeting under the Chairmanship of V N Gaur, CEO, FSSAI. According to a press note released by the body, Gaur welcomed the representatives from various food industries and organisations, while Ravi Mathur, CEO, GS1, described the objectives of Global Product Recall Portal. The Product Recall Pilot is going to be conducted using recall portal service involving food producers, modern trade retailers and FSSAI to test the efficacy of recall prior to finalisation of recall regulation by FSSAI. The FSSAI has prepared draft guidelines on food recall procedures, primarily to guide food business operators to carry out a food recall through an efficient, rapid identification as well as removal of unsafe food and to inform the consumers about the potentially hazardous food in the market. In order to overcome the drawbacks in the Internal Product Recall System set up by the food producers and retailers, and to benefit the Indian food industry and exports through enhanced market shares with the implementation of Standardised National Recall Portal. Through this mechanism, the entire Indian food sector would be able to inspire greater trust and confidence of Indian and international consumers, buyers, regulators etc. in their products and their ability to manage food crisis". 

With about 12 million retail stores peddling thousands of products made by industries coming under the categories of micro enterprises, small scale manufacturers, medium and large scale players including many transnational companies and their subsidiaries, how the new ambitious program is going to be implemented is a mystery. In a country where the traders blatantly defy the food laws with impunity, consumers have long resigned to buying sub-par products at exorbitant prices stoking the inflation and putting their lives in jeopardy. Though food cannot be retailed without pilfer-proof packing with transparent labels as per the existing law, loose vending still continues and how can any one enforce the product recall regime with these prodigal business groups? First priority for any sincere efforts to streamline the food marketing is enforcing the existing laws ruthlessly and accord severe deterrent punishment to those who take liberty with the law of the land. As long as the retail sector is not organized, it is doubtful whether the unorganized sector can ever be forced to follow the regulations that exist in the statute book.  

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

HEALTH OF RESTAURANT WORKERS-A GREY AREA OF MUCH CONCERN

Eating out practice is becoming more and more ingrained into the life styles of most urban dwellers and with increasing wealth accumulation through better economic development, the so called middle class population do not want to be left out of the pleasure of eating out more and more frequently. This trend is further accentuated because of the socio-economic changes taking place in many developing countries resulting in more number of nuclear families. With both husband and wife working for earning adequately to maintain a decent life style, time is at a premium and the kitchen responsibilities are progressively getting reduced. Under such circumstances it becomes the primary responsibility of the health authorities to ensure that restaurant foods are absolutely safe. Though there are many serious food poisoning episodes, reported in the Western world from restaurant foods, in absence of any verifiable documentation system in countries like India, the seriousness or other wise about any danger posed by food preparations served in catering places in these countries cannot ascertained. The initiative by the Colombo authorities to put in place a vigilance system to monitor the health conditions of the workers in restaurants is indeed laudable. Probably urban regions in other countries also must consider emulating this effort for the sake of tourists as well as the local population that frequent public eateries.

Concerned by mounting health complaints from guests who have fallen ill after consuming food served in Colombo hotels, the Colombo Municipal Council which recently made it mandatory that all food handlers and staff in the hotel industry get a medical check up, is stepping up these operations. "We're not doing this to harass the hotel industry, but rather to help the industry which is developing rapidly now with many more tourists and locals patronising it and consuming hotel meals," Dr Pradeep Kariyawasam, Chief Medical Officer of the Colombo Municipal Council told The Nation. "Many of the health problems resulting from the consumption of hotel meals could have been passed by the food handlers themselves. This is why we think it is important that all hotel staff especially food handlers, undergo a thorough medical check up."

In India each municipal body has a health officer vested with the responsibility of monitoring the hygienic and sanitary conditions of the public eateries licensed by it but with grossly inadequate facilities and personnel, such offices are more decorative than functional. The quality of workers employed by these eateries is no body's business with all sorts of people including children being deployed by the industry. Most of these workers are illiterate, unhealthy, lethargic besides being too poor to maintain good health conditions. Most state governments are too much concerned about the "rights" of these workers like minimum wages, bonus and other working conditions while their responsibilities vis-a-vis keeping good health and appearance are totally ignored. It is time for an overhaul of the working force in the hotel industry keeping in view the interests of customers, workers and the management.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

UNORGANIZED FOOD PROCESSORS-SAFETY ISSUES

Micro enterprises, confined largely to cottage scale processing of foods do not have the wherewithal to judge the quality or safety of the products made by them. They generally do not use sophisticated process technologies, confining them selves to dehydrated, fried, baked, pickled and sugar preserved products. Most of these products are relatively stable for a few days and do not pose high safety risks. Governments with responsibility to assure food safety to the consumers are always pulled between the plight of small processors and the potential risks the foods produced by them pose to the public. Here is an example from the US itself where the share of micro food enterprises is negligible in the market.

"Legislation that eased restrictions on cottage food businesses in Wyoming has touched off a debate over government's role in overseeing homemade food products. Some health officials worry rules that allow home-produced foods to be sold without inspection at farmers' markets and roadside stands expose people to risk from food-borne illness and unlabeled allergens. They also say inspectors can regulate cottage foods without placing an onerous burden on the people who produce them".

In India food processing in the so called unorganized sector is more than that by the organized licensed industries and there is little control government has on the quality and safety of the products made by the former. While in urban areas Municipal Health Officer is "supposed" to keep an eye on food handling groups including restaurants, very little is done in practice due to severe constraints vis-a-vis technical man power and monitoring infrastructure. As for rural areas it a free for all situation with any one and every one being able to deal with food, unnoticed, unchecked and unconcerned!

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com