Abstract
Food safety is a fundamental issue affecting the lives and health of many. India with its vast and diverse food sector faces a persistent problem of adulteration and food contamination. Ranging from food sold loose by vendors on the street to packed food produced in factories and industries on a large scale, food adulteration is omnipresent. Even though stringent food regulations like Food safety and standards act of 2006 are present in the country, the effectiveness and implementation remains questionable and concerning.
The research paper aims to critically examine the prevalence of food adulteration in India along with analysing the loopholes in the existing legal provisions and the implementation challenges faced in enforcing the food laws. The paper also tries to examine food safety and efforts required to ensure it, in the journey of food from farm to fork.
Keywords: food safety, adulteration, FSSAI, food laws, health, right to safe food
Introduction
Adulteration refers to a(dding something in food to lower its quality. Usually cheaper, low quality or harmful substances are added to food in order to increase its quantity and the profit share of the person selling it. Though it also includes chemicals, pesticides and other materials added to food which contaminate it.
“Adulterant” means any material which is or could be employed for making the food unsafe or sub-standard or mis-branded or containing extraneous matter.
The adulteration of food not only cheats the consumers of their money but also of their health by adversely affecting it, making it a point of concern. Wherein adulteration is a means to increase the profit it is said to be intentional as the person knowingly adds harmful substances, whereas contamination caused by lack of proper storage facilities etc is known as unintentional adulteration.
With the famous Landmark case of Donoghue Vs. Stevenson, while the rule for negligence was established, another prime issue underlying the presence of the snail in the bottle was of food safety.
Food safety pertains to preventing food from contamination as well as preserving it before it reaches the consumer.
“Food Safety” means assurance that food is acceptable for human consumption according to its intended use.
Thus food safety and adulteration are interrelated. From milk to grains to oil, adulteration can be found in nearly every item of consumption used in daily lives. With this protecting consumers and their health becomes more important than ever.
As adulterated food affects a person’s health it is an intrinsic part of article 21 that is right to life and further right to health enshrined under it. The food regulations like the FSSA 2006 aim to ensure the quality and safety of food products in the manufacturing, processing, storage, and various other stages of food production. The people at various stages of the food production sector are further obligated by these laws to ensure the safety of the food so produced.
Research Methodology
The research paper uses doctrinal research method to critically examine food adulteration and the prevalent food safety laws in India. The study includes a systematic examination of case laws, statute, legal provisions, articles with a focus on primary sources for legal research. Though secondary sources like newspaper articles and studies are also examined to corroborate the findings with data and aid a better understanding of the concepts involved.
The paper while analysing the existing provisions under laws in India also tries to suggest possible ways to overcome the challenge. It also includes careful examination of cases and judgements to create a lucid picture of the current regulations in India.
Review of literature
The paper analysis various judgements and the opinion of the judges involved. Among them Justice V. R. Krishna Iyer has pronounced a strong view against the menace of food adulteration as follows:
“Adulteration of food is so dangerous and widespread and has so often led to large human tragedies, sudden or slow, insidious or open, that Social defence compels casting of absolute liability on the criminal, even if the particular offence is committed with an unsuspecting means to take risks,in the name of very gullible dealers or very ignorant distributors,when the consequences may spell disaster on innocent victims, fee ot many, is legislative lackadaisical conduct, giving the wildest hostage to fortune. So it is that mens rea is excluded and the proofof actus (reum) is often enough.
As per the 21st Law Commision of India (constituted in 2017) report: As we are aware that adulteration of food causes several health problems in humans. Most of the food adulterants are very harmful and toxic; yet, the greed and profit motive encourages anti-social persons for adulteration. Therefore, the tackling of food adulteration is required to be given due importance for its serious effect on the health of the public
“Big Agri-business Corporations operate within Third World countries promise, green revolutions, manipulate seeds through genetic control, produce more grain to make their gains, but before long create an agricultural slavery. Pest management through pesticides which are dangerous and fertilizers sold at great price which in the long run destroy the soil cumulatively land up agriculturists in a chemical trap. A myth was created that corporate agri-business is good for the Third World. In truth fertilizers and pesticides dumped on the Third world enter the food chain, wind up in human tissue and produce grave health hazards. In short, using the scarcity scare, India and like countries are victims of the ‘poison business’ promoted by the US and G-7 countries under guise of greater benefits.”
Prevalence and impact of food adulteration
The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates a global food adulteration rate of 22%, impacting a staggering 57% of the population.According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), developing countries bear the brunt of this crisis, experiencing adulteration rates as high as 50% in certain regions.
In a shocking revelation, the Food and Drug administration (FDA) Mumbai in 2007, has said that “nearly 25% of the milk produced in the state is adulterated, which are responsible for causing a spectrum of disease from minor health problem like diarrhea to serious problem like cancer.
Contamination of mycotoxins, metals and pesticides in daily foods and milk has been found highly toxic and carcinogenic, and about 70% of deaths are supposed to be of food-borne origin.
There exists little scientific data to substantiate that adulterated food is responsible for poor health and other health related problems though experts as per certain studies have concluded that adulterated food adversely impacts the health of the person consuming it.
The increased instances of Cancer another lifestyle diseases can be directly ascribed to the consumption of adulterated food, and particularly the chemicals and pesticides present in the food, as per experts.
These all along with the recent allegations of the Tirupati Laddu Prasadam being adulterated show that food adulteration is a persistent and growing problem and showcases the urgency to focus on food safety and its application.
Right to safe and healthy food
Right to healthy and nutritious food can be said to be an important part of right to health and life aspart of fundamental rights given in the constitution.
Article 21 of the Constitution of India guarantees the right to live with dignity. The right to live with human dignity denies the life breach from the Directive Principles of the State Policy, particularly clauses (e) and (f) of Article 39 read with Article 47 of the Constitution of India. Article 47 reads as follows:
“47. Duty of the State to raise the level of nutrition and the standard of living and to improve public health.- The State shall regard the raising of the level of nutrition and the standard of living of its people and the improvement of public health as among its primary duties and, in particular, the State shall endeavour to bring about prohibition of the consumption except for medicinal purposes of intoxicating drinks and of drugs which are injurious to health.”
Further, Article 12 of the International Covenant on Economics, Social and Cultural Rights, 1966 reads as follows:
“12.- (1) The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health.
Thus, Enjoyment of life and its attainment, including right to life and human dignity encompasses, within its ambit availability of articles of food, without insecticides or pesticides residues, veterinary drugs residues, antibiotic residues, solvent residues, etc.
The state is obligated to ensure access of healthy food to its citizens and make laws and implement them for the same.
Existing provisions and food laws in India
- The Prevention of Food Adulteration act 1954
- Fruit Products Order, 1955
- Meat Food Products Order, 1973
- Vegetable Oil products (Control) Order, 1947
- Edible Oils Packaging (Regulation) Order 1988
- Solvent Extracted Oil. De oiled Meal and Edible flour (Control) Order, 1967
- Milk and Milk Products Order, 1992
were grouped together and consolidated as the Food Safety and Standards act of 2006. It was through the act that the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) was established as a statutory body under the union ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
FSSAI lays down scientific standards for food and regulates the various stages of it’s production and supply. It is the single reference point for matters arsing out in the country about food safety and related concerns.
The main role of Authority is to regulate and monitor, manufacture, processing, distribution, sale and import of food while ensuring safe and wholesome food to the consumers. Some of the functions laid down by the act for discharge by the Authority include-
(a) Prescribing the Standards & Guidelines in relation to food and specified appropriate system for enforcement.
(b) Specifying limits for Additives, Contaminants, Pesticides & Veterinary Drug Residues, Heavy Metals, Processing Aids, Mycotoxins, Antibiotics and Pharmacological active substances and Irradiated Foods
(c) Lay down food labelling standards including claims on health, nutrition, special dietary uses and food category system for foods.
(d) Lay down methods of sampling, analysis and exchange of information among enforcement agencies prescribing procedures and guidelines for accreditation of certification bodies and laboratories.
Further obeying such standards of food as set by FSSAI with recomendations from scientific committees, is enforced by provisions and rules like the FSSA 2006. Thus the act and body together work inorder
- To prevent adulteration
- Enforce food safety standards set after scientific recommendation
- Licencing and registration of food business operators
- Packaging and labelling of food items to provide consumers with necessary information
- Analysing the permissible limits for toxins and contaminants
- Though the implementation and enforcement makes the relevance and effectiveness of these provisions questionable.
- Section 50 of the FSSA lays down a fine upto 2 lakh rupees for selling food not in compliance with the act or food that is not of the nature, quality or substance as demanded by the purchaser.
- While section 51 penalises distribution, storage and selling of food unfit for human consumption, with a fine upto 5 lakh.
- Sec 52 talks about import of such items. Sec 53 deals with publishing misleading advertisement as well as making claims about the food products inorder to deceive the consumers about the product’s true nature.
- Further sec 54 stipulates as follows: Any person whether by himself or by any other person on his behalf manufactures for sale or stores or sells or distributes or imports any article of food for human consumption containing extraneous matter, shall be liable to a penalty which may extend to one lakh rupees.
- Other related sections include Section 56 which imposes penalty for unhygienic or unsanitary processing or manufacturing of food, and the act even provides a penalty for possessing adulterants.
- Once a food item or product is found to be adulterated and containing harmful substances, an injunction maybe issued with regards to its production as well as the existing products of the batch may even be destroyed as was seen in the Maggi India 2015 case.
Provisions under BNS
Also sec 274 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita punishes a person who adulterates a food item or drink intended for sale.
With such stringent regulations and frameworks still food adulteration in India remains unaddressed, with adulterated food being sold openly without any action being taken.
Why are the food laws still ineffective?
Though the presence of strong food safety laws is undebatable, they merely exist without enough fund with regulatory body to implement them properly.
- The regulatory body and it’s officers at the state level fail to ensure regular checks of the quality of food belonging to various food operators ranging from big companies to small business owners.
- Labelling of food items still goes on to deceive the purchasers of the contents of the food items they are consuming. This includes not only mentioning the ingredients present in the product in less than actual quantity to make it seem healthier but also omitting from mentioning certain other substances whose presence makes these food items unhealthy and disease causing.
- While adulteration remains rampant, the surprise inspections and food inspectors are not able to catch with the continuous and evergrowing problem.
- Corruption and negligence are other issues which result in lack of enforcement of the laws.
- Also the people are not much aware about food safety, due to which bisinesses have a lenient approach towards the issue.
- Another reason includes a difference between demand and supply of food items. When the demand exceeds the amount of food supplied, sellers tend to adulterate it inprder to extract more profit as well as satiate the demand.
INTERNATIONAL GUIDELINES
CODEX ALIMENTARIOUS
These are the international guidelines prevalent globally promoted by food and agriculture organisation.
If a foodstuff marketed under a certain wrapping or label does not comply satisfactorily with the minimum standard in the European Codex Alimentarius for such wrappings or labels the merchandise may, depending on circumstances, be considered as injurious to health, spoiled, unripe, adultered or misleadingly packed or labelled.
The minimum standards laid down in the European Codex Alimentarius for foodstuffs marketed under certain labels or in certain wrappings are drafted so that they may easily be observed if the goods are properly manufactured, produced and processed and so that it is easily possible by scientifically proven methods to establish any deviations from these minimum requirements shown by the foodstuffs.
The Indian laws are made in accordance with the international guidelines.
Conclusion
Food adulteration is an ever growing menace in the country as well as around the globe. Tackling the problem, though difficult, is very important to ensure not only availability of safe and healthy food to the consumers but also a good health to the public at large.
Though there are specific laws in the country, catering to the issue, there still is a need to improve the implementation as well as enforcement of these food laws across India. Increasing the number of food inspectors in States as well as surprise inspections carried out by them could help in mitigating the problem.
While regulatory measures by the state remain important vigilance of the consumers and purchasers is as important as the role of the state. The consumers should be aware of their rights and the duties of the food operators towards them. They should be free to approach the justice mechanisms as and when needed, easily, in case of breach of this duty and their rights.
The paper analysed the current provisions and their purpose along with an attempt to highlight implementation gaps in the same. With this the paper ends on a note of optimism about future reforms and research regarding the same.
Sheffali Verma
UILS, PU chd.