DTMT Network

There is a need for a law on front-of-pack labeling that can inform the Indian consumer about unhealthy packaged junk foods simply and effectively, demands Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) in its latest analysis.

CSE is a not-for-profit public interest research and advocacy organisation based in Delhi.

The analysis of CSE systematically presents how after seven years, four committees and two draft regulations, India still does not have the much-needed front-of-pack labelling law to ‘warn’ consumers about harmful levels of fat, salt and sugar hiding in ultra-processed junk foods.

Sunita Narain, director general, CSE, said that countries are working to find ways to nudge consumers into healthy food choices and to contain the growing crisis of obesity and diet-related non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, hypertension and heart ailments.

She added that t is a crisis that increasingly impacts children and also worsens the COVID-19 symptoms.

Narain further said that front-of-pack labelling is an effective tool in this effort. The current nutrition information on the food pack only helps the industry to keep consumers confused and does not let them know about how bad their food is.

Amit Khurana, director, food safety and toxins programme at CSE and lead author of the analysis, pointed out that the CSE was part of the FSSAI-constituted committee that first proposed front-of-pack labelling in India in 2014.

Ever since, the packaged junk food industry is pushing hard to delay it and make it weak.

“While the lobbying by powerful industries is not surprising, the real concern is that the FSSAI has been hesitant to take a strong stand to protect the interest of consumers and public health,” Khurana added.

As per CSE statement, the analysis enumerates how the draft thresholds (limits above which a product could be marked unhealthy) proposed by the FSSAI-constituted working group have suited the packaged food industry, as they were much relaxed than those proposed by FSSAI in its earlier labelling drafts of 2018 and 2019 as well as those adopted by countries with best practices.

The draft proposed thresholds have now been put on hold; most consumer organisations had opposed them.

The CSE said that this working group was formed to look into the issue of thresholds following a CSE study (December 2019) which said that most popular packaged junk foods have salt and fat content several times higher than the thresholds proposed by FSSAI in its labelling drafts of 2018 and 2019; therefore, they would have been marked ‘red’ as per the proposed law at that time.

 “We also opposed the last-minute FSSAI proposal of including ‘positive nutrients’ in the label. We are certain that it will only give industry a chance to claim its bad food as good food and mislead the consumer. These recent consultations were like one-step forward and two-steps backwards. We are far behind where we were in 2018 and we do not know which way it will go,” Khurana said.