The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has announced plans to amend the existing rules with regard to the labeling of products.
Following the introduction of new rules, the labels on the packaged food will highlight the list of ingredients in a detailed manner with fonts that are bigger in size.
The latest decision by FSSAI is set to come into force owing to the addition of new ingredients to the products.
FSSAI scientific panel on labeling and claims chairman Dr Sesikeran was quoted by The Times of India as saying that the notification of final draft will be presented to the public soon.
"Manufacturers make a lot of claims on the benefits of their products. They will be allowed to publish the claims on the labeling only after results of authentic scientific research are shown to the FSSAI," Sesikeran added.
New rules will be framed in such a way that even information pertaining to the salt, sugar and transfat content has to be clearly mentioned on the labels, in order to avoid words that are misleading.
The FSSAI has already interacted with the industry regarding new proposed changes, which are said to be consumer friendly.
The final draft on labeling is expected to be presented in August 2014.
Established under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, FSSAI is said to be a statutory body. It lays down science based standards for articles of food and regulating manufacturing, processing, distribution, sale as well as import of food.
