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State stops junk food around schools in latest post-Maggi safety move

By RJ Whitehead

- Last updated on GMT

State stops junk food around schools in latest post-Maggi safety move

Related tags Food safety Junk food Nutrition

State stops junk food around schools in latest post-Maggi safety move

A northeastern Indian state has placed restrictions on the availability of junk food in and around its schools and colleges. 

Junk

Zaveyi Nyekha, Nagaland’s director of education, said that rising cases of obesity, hypertension and diabetes  among school children had prompted the move. 

Schools should ensure that the message against junk food is constantly reiterated to students by taking steps like placing signboards and hoardings in and around the campus​,” said Nyekha. 

Schools should also raise awareness by conducting programmes and discussions among students so as to inform and educate them on healthy food and healthy eating habits​.” 

Nagaland is the latest of India’s states to heighten monitoring of food safety, standards or nutrition practices prompted by the ongoing Maggi noodle crisis that has raged for the last few weeks after tests claimed to find elevated levels of monosodium glutamate and lead in the wildly popular snack.

It is perhaps because the first Maggi finding was done at state level that individual states have been taking the fore in food regulation, especially with the Centre bogged down by the bumbling Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), the embattled federal regulator.

A number of states, led by Uttar Pradesh, whose Department of Food and Drug Administration outed the MSG and lead claims, have also banned the sale of Maggi noodles within their boundaries and introduced tough.

It doesn’t help that the FSSAI is reportedly chronically understaffed, according to sources to the New Indian Express, who claimed that 70% of posts in the regulator’s Karnataka state office lay vacant.

The health ministry has submitted a US$276m proposal to India’s Cabinet to fund a reform of the FSSAI, The Indian Express ​cited sources as saying.

According to the daily, the proposal focuses on four main areas: strengthening the state inspection apparatus, bolstering the FSSAI’s manpower, giving it more powers and providing access to state-of-the-art technology.

Currently, [the FSSAI] is a rudimentary set-up. In fact, 16 states do not even have a food testing laboratory. The actual increase in staff strength will have to be worked out once the proposal is passed because revamping the state food safety set-up is a very important part of the plan​,” the source said.

Elsewhere, the Maggi controversy has brought into focus the “importance of food safety and the pitfalls of celebrity endorsement of unhealthy food products​,” according to a leading Indian media researcher.

Writing in the Deccan Herald​, Dinesh C Sharma, a fellow at the Centre for Media Studies in New Delhi, ​also said thatBig Food targets its products to children through advertising to “influence nutritional knowledge and food preferences in children​”. 

India does not currently regulate food advertising, leading calls for “advertisers and endorsers to be made liable for false or unsubstantiated claims made in an endorsement​” so as to ensure better protection for consumers. 

The issue of misleading claims made by food companies, unbridled use of celebrity power to promote unhealthy food products and targeting of children in all junk food advertising, is as serious as food safety itself​.”

Dairy under closer surveillance after alleged detergent find

Staying with regulation, the FSSAI has asked all states to keep a strict watch on dairy products, as well as packaged drinking water and edible oils.

The regulator has also called on food commissioners across India to collect more samples of these products and send them for testing.

"State food departments have been asked to be more vigilant and to increase surveillance activities, especially on milk, water and edible oil. Serious violations of labelling requirements have been observed​," an official inside the FSSAI told The Times of India​.

The directive comes after detergent was allegedly found in Mother Dairy milk samples in Agra. Officials said other dairy products including milk powder, processed cheese, butter and flavoured milks would also be included in the drive.

Mother Dairy has denied the official findings in Agra, claiming the tests had been done on loose samples.

ITC under the microscope as regulators call for nutrition clarification

ITC has been given 15 days to clarify the nutritional claims it authors on the labels of its Sunfeast Yippee noodles line after Uttarakhand officials tested samples from a store in Haridwar.

"The notice directs ITC to provide nutrients profile and lab reports to back their claims of energy, protein, carbohydrate, sugar and calcium​," said Dilip Jain, the food safety officer who carried out the operation, told The Economic Times​. 

State authorities have also asked about the vegetarian certificates of the flavour enhancers ITC uses in the product, and called on the company to provide shelf-life analysis from FSSAI-accredited labs.

Earlier this month, Uttarakhand’s government banned the sale of Maggi for three months after a sample failed local tests due to an excessive content of MSG and lead.

Reduced planting and heavy rainfall behind remarkable cumin price growth

Cumin

Cumin prices have now increased by almost one-third in 2015 after a surge of 6% last month continued an impressive year in the spice’s fortunes.

Unexpectedly heavy March rainfall in the main cumin growing regions of Gujarat and Rajasthan damaged 30-35% of the crop. 

As a result, Indian cumin production for 2015 is forecast down by 20%, with the adverse weather also delaying harvest, says Mintec, a commodities and raw materials analyst. 

There has also been a 30% decline in cumin planted area this year compared to 2014, with more farmers switching to other profitable crops due to low cumin prices seen in the last two years. 

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1 comment

IT SEEMED TO BE AN EMERGING OPINION AND CHALLENGING SITUATION BEFORE THE FOOD REGULATORS IN INDIA THAT TIME MAY BE RIPE NOW FOR INDIA TO PROMULGATE “JUNK FOOD TAX---

Posted by Ajoy Daspurkayastha,

IT SEEMED TO BE AN EMERGING OPINION AND CHALLENGING SITUATION BEFORE THE FOOD REGULATORS IN INDIA THAT TIME MAY BE RIPE NOW FOR INDIA TO PROMULGATE “JUNK FOOD TAX---EXCESS FAT FOOD TAX /EXCESS SALTY FOOD TAX /EXCESS SUGARY FOOD TAX”SPECIALLY WHEN INDIA THROUGH CODEX-INDIA REPRESENTATIVE BOASTS 3 TIMES CHAIRMAN OF CODEX ALIMENTARIUS COMMISSION SESSIONED AT ROME,ITALY (THE UNIVERSAL FOOD LAW COMMISSION IN THE WORLD PARLIAMENT OF FOOD COMPRISING OF 186 MEMBERS –185 COUNTRIES AND THE EUROPEAN UNION)AND LEAD BY EXAMPLE BEFORE THE LEAGUE OF FOOD AND HEALTH LOVING NATIONS”
“Denmark has brought in a "fat tax", Hungary a "junk food tax" and France a tax on all sweetened drinks. Peru intends to add levies to junk food and Ireland may also introduce such taxes. David Cameron last October said the UK should considering following suit. Mexico Nears Junk Food Tax”

Public health and safety above all else when it is related to food in general and processed food in particular. India has a unputdownable food safety leadership in the World of food in general and processed foods in particular
Dr. Binay Ranjan Sen,Indian Ex-Ambassador to USA,Italy,Mexico,Japan,Yogoslavia and World’s first Asian Director General of Food and Agriculture Organization,Rome,Italy from 1956 to 1967 (Reference :---- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binay_Ranjan_Sen )
Codex Alimentarius Commission(Equivalent to Universal Food safety Law Commission),Italy, Rome took birth in 1963 and the present FSSAI(Food Safety and Standards Authority of India,New Delhi) Advisor Mr. Sanjay Dave was also the 3 times Chairman(2011 ----2014) of Codex Alimentarius Commission(Equivalent to Universal Food safety Law Commission),Italy,Rome, speak volumes in itself that India is having a high reputation in terms of food safety leadership in the world stage like that of Codex Alimentarius Commission(Equivalent to Universal Food safety Law Commission),Italy, Rome ( QUOTE---- Codex Members and Observers---Currently the Codex Alimentarius Commission has:
186 Codex Members - 185 Member Countries and 1 Member Organization (EU) 230 Codex Observers - 52 IGOs, 162 NGOs, 16 UN.---UNQUOTE Reference:--- http://www.codexalimentarius.org/members-observers/en/)

Most importantly the present FSSAI Chief Executive Officer Shri Yudhvir Singh Malik who is one of India’s best IAS officer(Haryana Cadre) and who had 52 weeks training in development management ( first with distinction ) the University of Glasgow,United Kingdom way back in 1995 apart from various high profile distinguished services (Reference :--- http://persmin.nic.in/ersheet/MultipleERS.asp?HiddenStr=01HY015800 )speak volumes in itself that India has everything in tackling food safety as a national priority .

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