FSSAI publishes new guidelines for online food marketplaces
For packaged goods, the Food Safety and Standards Association of India (FSSAI) has developed new regulations. While the group has previously released guidelines for vegan items, the current issue is the labelling of food served by online meal delivery services. FSSAI requested that all food business operators (FBOs) guarantee compliance with its rules on the display of nutritional value by food service businesses beginning on July 1 in a letter it sent to all FBOs. These new regulations are praised for being more client-friendly.
The content of FSSAI letter
The request in the letter is very clear: “All e-commerce food business operators are hereby directed to enable provision in their online platforms including mobile applications for display of nutritional information… so that FBOs registered on your respective platforms would be able to feed and update such information in respect to each dish/food they are offering for sale.” This implies that everyone selling food on online food marketplaces will need to publish the calorific value as well as nutritional and allergy information.
Labelling is necessary
The effort is intended to educate consumers about the type of food they are purchasing online, as well as the type of nutritional and allergy content, according to Arun Singhal, Chief Executive Officer of FSSAI, addressing the press media. People should be aware of what they are eating, he continued. Labels are present on packaged food, although they are absent from prepared foods like Dal Makhni or Butter Chicken. Cooked food menu labels will encourage people to eat healthfully.
The violation carries penalty to infringers
Those who disregard these stringent guidelines will get an improvement notice. And if they continue to disobey the rules, their licence will be revoked.