ROLE OF STANDARDS IN FOOD SAFETY Dr. R. K. Bajaj Bureau of Indian Standards

IMPORTANCE OF FOOD "God comes to the hungry in the form of food” – Mahatma Gandhi. Food is essential to nourish any living being.  Our physical and mental health also depends on the food we eat.  Access to good quality and safe food has been man's main endeavour from the earliest days of human existence.

FOOD SAFETY FOOD SAFETY is non-negotiable basic requirement of food quality.

FOOD SAFETY By definition, Food Safety is the condition that ensures that food will not cause any harm to the consumer when it is prepared and/or eaten according to its intended use.  It implies absence or acceptable and safe levels of contaminants, adulterants, naturally occurring toxins or any other substance that may make food injurious to health.

GRAVITY OF SITUATION Since, every person eats food, every person is at risk of foodborne illness. As per a UNICEF report, in India an estimated 4,00,000 children below five years age die each year due to diarrhoea. Several millions more suffer from multiple episodes of diarrhoea. Still others fall ill on account of hepatitis A, enteric fever, etc. As per a WHO report,  diarrhoeal diseases alone, a considerable proportion of which is foodborne, kill 1.9 million children every year  most of these deaths occur in developing countries. A large proportion of these cases are attributed to poor hygiene and contamination of food and drinking water.

AFFECTING FACTORS  Food Hygiene  Food Adulteration  Food Contamination

WTO-SPS AGREEMENT Agreement on Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS) relating to protection of human, animal and plant health and life is extremely relevant to food safety and quality issues in international trade. The SPS Agreement covers all relevant laws, decrees, regulations; testing, inspection certification and approval procedures; packaging and labelling requirements directly related to food safety and encourages use of standards where they exist.

ROLE OF STANDARDS The main objectives behind formulation of standards include:  Promoting public health by reducing the risk of food borne illness;  Protecting consumers from unsanitary, unwholesome, mislabelled or adulterated food; and  Providing a sound regulatory foundation for domestic and international trade in food.

ROLE OF STANDARDS Standardization results in harmonization of working procedures. Standardization provides benefits to manufacturer’s, consumers and service providers alike in various ways such as sustainable development, safety of products and services delivered.

ROLE OF STANDARDS The current legislative requirements have put tremendous emphasis on food hygiene, Good Manufacturing Practices, Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP), Food Safety Management Systems (FSMS) and nutritional labeling.

BUREAU OF INDIAN STANDARDS (BIS)  National Standards body of India  Constituted under the Bureau of Indian Standards Act, 1986 as a statutory body and works under the aegis of Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Govt. of India. Objectives Harmonious development of the activities of Standardization, Quality and Certification

Some Statistics for Food & Agriculture Department (as on 1 st April 2012)  Total Number of Standards in Force 1870  Standards with Eco-Requirement 88  Total IS harmonized with ISO 222  Total IS harmonized with Codex 104  Total Standards under BIS Certification 172

Product Standards – 1187 Tests Methods – 363 Code of Practices – 156 Terminology – 39 Dimension – 1 Symbols – 4 Others – 120 TOTAL– 1870 Some Statistics for Food & Agriculture Department (as on 1 st April 2012)

CONCLUSION  Food Safety is a complex process.  Requires involvement of all stakeholders.  A majority of our food businesses small and cottage scale units are grey area. Standards have immense potential to safeguard public health and also promote the confidence of the consumer on entire gamut of food industry, if implemented efficiently. Implementation of these standards can give rise to exceptional improvements in food safety performance, but requires high level of commitment and full functional involvement of all stakeholders, particularly the industry.

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