Food Safety and Standards Authority of India is an autonomous body established under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, under the Government of India. It is headed by a non-executive Chairperson, appointed by the Central Government, either holding or has held the position of not below the rank of Secretary to the Government of India.

Each Indian state has its own State FSSA under the Act. Every FSSAI registration and State FSSAI license are issued by the state FSSA in which business operations are set up. The central FSSAI license is issued by the main FSSA authority.

What are the roles and responsibilities of the FSSAI?

They handle a lot of smaller tasks throughout the country, but their most significant roles are:

• Framing of Regulations to lay down food safety standards.
• Laying down guidelines for accreditation of laboratories for food testing.
• Providing scientific advice and technical support to the Central Government.
• Contributing to the development of international technical standards in food.
• Collecting and collating data regarding food consumption, contamination, emerging risks etc.
• Disseminating information and promoting awareness about food safety and nutrition in India.

A lot of the food being sold out there, although tasty, might not have all the nutritional value that it should and this can sometimes lead to malnutrition. Keeping a check on this is another one of the tasks handled by the FSSAI. Additionally, there are a couple of things that you probably didn’t know about the FSSAI and we have mentioned them below.

• Every business that has something to do with food-related operations has to make sure that they fall within FSSAI Licence or Registration guidelines. Overall, they lay down standards to regulate the manufacture, storage, distribution, sale and import to ensure availability of safe and wholesome food for human consumption. The criteria for getting a licence would depend on a couple of variables:

1. nature of the business
2. capacity of production
3. area of operation
4. the scale of operations, etc.

• With the introduction of the FSSAI, several smaller and narrower laws were replaced to bring in this all-encompassing Act. We bid farewell to the following laws:

1. Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954
2. Fruit Products Order, 1955,
3. Meat Food Products Order, 1973,
4. Vegetable Oil Products (Control) Order, 1947,
5. Edible Oils Packaging (Regulation) Order 1988,
6. Solvent Extracted Oil, De-Oiled Meal and Edible Flour (Control) Order, 1967,
7. Milk and Milk Products Order, 1992 etc. will be repealed after commencement of FSS Act, 2006.

• The FSSAI Act planned on establishing a network that helps all consumers, panchayats, local authorities, etc. to dispense speedy and reliable information about food safety across the country, while also creating a single authority and point of contact for all matters relating to food safety and standards.
• According to the new regulations of FSSAI, food businesses are not allowed to use or modify words like fresh, natural, pure, authentic, genuine, traditional or real on their food labels or packaging unless the products are not processed, or only peeled, chilled, washed, or trimmed.
• The FSSAI license number is a 14-digit number that must be printed on all the food packaging by a business that is registered under the FSSAI. A business that fails to print its FSSAI number on packages may face heavy penalties.
• Simpler rules that the FSSAI have made mandatory to follow are:

1. FSSAI logo with its license
2. Vegetarian / non-vegetarian Mark
3. Hall Mark
4. Ingredients in the product being made
5. Nutritional value in percentage
6. Manufacture and expiration dates have to be mentioned on the product.

• The FSSAI provides three types of licences based on the scale of the business. These are

1. FSSAI Registration for businesses with an annual turnover of up to Rs. 12 lakh.
2. State FSSAI License for medium-scale businesses with an expected annual turnover of more than Rs. 12 lakh to Rs. 20 crores.
3. Central FSSAI License for large-scale businesses with an expected annual turnover of more than Rs. 20 crore.

Although it takes about two months to apply through the FSSAI and get a licence, post that, products take about 6 months to be approved by them and thereby launched into the market. Post this approval process, they would be allowed to use the FSSAI logo on their packaging. Additionally, this also means that they match all the other requirements of the FSSAI.

In an effort to create awareness about food and its safety, the FSSAI has provided the common man with all the information they could need about various products that they purchase. All the information is not mandatory added to the packets so they can no longer be duped. Furthermore, they even force companies to recall their food and execute random inspections. Additionally, if companies try to make changes, they could get in trouble and if they do not register, they could be penalised for selling to the public.

Benefits of FSSAI Certificate

Who Needs An FSSAI License?