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4th State Food Safety Index (SFSI): FSSAI

Posted on June 8, 2022 by admin1  82

In News

  • Recently, on the occasion of World Food Safety Day, the Union Health Minister of India announced the State Food Safety Index awards.

State Food Safety Index (SFSI)

  • Developed By: Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) in 2018-19.
  • Aim: 
    • To measure the performance of states on various parameters of Food Safety.  
    • Creating a competitive and positive change in India’s food safety ecosystem.
  • Five significant parameters for Ranking:
    • Human Resources and Institutional Data, 
    • Compliance, 
    • Food Testing – Infrastructure and Surveillance, 
    • Training & Capacity Building and 
    • Consumer Empowerment.  

Major Highlights

  • Large States: Tamil Nadu topped the list among larger states, followed by Gujarat and Maharashtra.
  • Smaller States: Goa was the winner, followed by Manipur and Sikkim, 
  • Union territories: Jammu and Kashmir emerged top, followed by Delhi and Chandigarh.
  • States that showed significant improvement were also felicitated.
  • Other Points:
    • To motivate smart cities to develop and execute a plan that supports a healthy, safe, and sustainable food environment through adoption of various Eat Right India initiatives. 11 winning smart cities of the EatSmart Cities Challenge were also fecilitated.
    • AyurvedaAahar logo, which contains the initials of Ayurveda and Ahara, the first in Devanagari and the second in English, with five leaves symbolising five elements of nature was also launched. This logo will help in easy identification of ayurvedic foods.
    • A guidance document on Food Borne Disease Outbreak Investigation and Microbiological Process Control, and Sampling and Testing of Fish and Fishery Products was released.

World Food Safety Day

  • Established by: The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in 2018
  • Aim: To raise awareness of Food Safety, an important issue. 
  • Observance: Every year on June 7 Jointly by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations, in collaboration with Member States and other stakeholders.
  • Theme for 2022: “Safer food, better health”, highlights the role that safe, nutritional food plays in ensuring human health and well-being and calls for a set of specific actions to make food safer.
  • Key Facts:
    • Food safety, nutrition and food security are inextricably linked.
    • An estimated 600 million – almost 1 in 10 people in the world – fall ill after eating contaminated food and 420 000 die every year, resulting in the loss of 33 million healthy life years (DALYs).
    • US$ 110 billion is lost each year in productivity and medical expenses resulting from unsafe food in low- and middle-income countries.
    • Children under 5 years of age carry 40% of the foodborne disease burden, with 125000 deaths every year.

Significance of SFSI

  • The Index is a dynamic quantitative and qualitative benchmarking model that provides an objective framework for evaluating food safety across all States/UTs.
  • The index will help in providing safe and nutritious food to Indian citizens.
  • These science based standards/parameters for articles of food and to regulate their manufacture, storage, distribution, sale and import ensures availability of safe and wholesome food for human consumption.

Eat Right India initiatives

  • Eat Right India which encompasses a wide range of initiatives and programmes. 
  • These initiatives aim to promote both the demand for and the supply of safe and healthy food in a sustainable way. 
    • While the supply-side interventions are aimed at building capacities of food businesses to promote self-compliance, 

Image Courtesy: ERI 

  • The demand-side initiatives work towards motivating consumers to demand safe and healthy food. 

Image Courtesy: ERI

  • The initiatives for the production and consumption of food in a sustainable way are aimed at promoting environment-friendly food practices and habits.

Image Courtesy: ERI

Challenges for Food Safety in India

  • Good collaboration between governments, producers and consumers which can  help ensure food safety and stronger food systems is lacking.
  • Urbanisation and changes in consumer habits have increased the number of people buying and eating food prepared in public places. 
  • Unsafe food containing harmful bacteria, viruses, parasites or chemical substances causes more than 200 diseases, ranging from diarrhoea to cancers. 
  • Such foods create a vicious cycle of disease and malnutrition, particularly affecting infants, young children, elderly and the sick. 
  • Globalisation has triggered growing consumer demand for a wider variety of foods, resulting in an increasingly complex and longer global food chain. 
  • Climate change is also predicted to impact food safety due to uneven rains causing an effect on quality and quantity of crops.

Way Ahead

  • The government should keep working to ensure health security for all through initiatives such as health and wellness centres and strengthening of district hospitals under the national health mission.
  • Governments need to make food safety a public health priority, as they play a pivotal role in developing policies and regulatory frameworks and establishing and implementing effective food safety systems.

Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI)

  • Established under Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, 
  • It is an autonomous body under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
  • Functions:
    • Setting science-based, globally benchmarked standards for food, 
    • Ensuring credible food-testing and compliance to these standards through surveillance and enforcement activities, 
    • Responsible for promoting and protecting public health through various regulations and supervisions of food safety.
    • It handles food-related issues including ensuring the safe availability of food for human consumption. 
  • Composition: 
    • It shall consist of a Chairperson and the following twenty-two members out of which one-third shall be women, namely:-
    • (a) seven Members, not below the rank of a Joint Secretary to the Government of India, to be appointed by the Central Government, to respectively represent the Ministries or Departments of the Central Government dealing with –
      • Agriculture,
      • Commerce,
      • Consumer Affairs,
      • Food Processing,
      • Health,
      • Legislative Affairs,
      • Small Scale Industries, who shall be Members ex officio;
    • (b) two representatives from food industry of which one shall be from small scale industries;
    • (c) two representatives from consumer organisations;
    • (d) three eminent food technologists or scientists;
    • (e) five members to be appointed by rotation every three years, one each in seriatim from the Zones as specified in the First Schedule to represent the States and the Union territories;
    • (f) two persons to represent farmers’ organisations;
    • (g) one person to represent retailers’ organisations.

Source: IE

 
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