Introduction
To increase the safety of the imported food, Food Safety and Standards Authority of India with the Custom and Excise Department made 125 places all over India for imports and clearances. This was made as part of the government’s push to ensure safety for the food business holders. The special grade custom officers are appointed by FSSAI at these 125 places called “authorized officials.” The officers are in charge of the checking and supervising samples, getting them checked by labs and reviewing results obtained and authorizing safety of products imported into the country.
Safety of imported food
FSSAI officers gave a word to Business Standard “The technical staff will be appointed by FSSAI department at these locations to ensure the safety of imported food in India.” Business Standard reviewed all documents related to the processes to safeguard food business for importers.
The plans organized to expand the FSSAI reach were on hold this year, and there were many schemes initiated by the central government with the budget of 1750 Crore to set forth the enforcement of food safety law.
The customs officers made issuing of samples mandatory for all the consignment of food imports and they will impose a legal force to ensure all the safety under FSSAI.
Most of the developed and developing nations like US, UK, Africa, etc have given safety officials 125 important points and also some of these nations carry out their own safety operations at the listed centers.
The new regulation initiated by FSSAI called “Risk Based Import Clearance System” which provides an easy way for testing the samples of imported food. With respect to this, FSSAI observed many reservations against this risk-based system in 2015. And FSSAI answered Finance Ministry that “By discussing above, it clearly states that in 47 (5) section FSSAI license doesn’t hold the power to make changes in the risk-based systems.” For this FSSAI is enabling new provisions to be added to the import regulations.
Finally, FSSAI states that there are 21 important points under control and maintenance of technical custom officials and also said that there is one-time online clearance providence at these places and monitoring all other places over India. And also claims that 90% of imports are from two ports, Chennai and Mumbai.
