Schoolchildren at a stall in Vijayawada. The Indian Vitamin Ranking system permits meals excessive in fats, salt and sugar, and extremely processed meals, equivalent to biscuits, flaunt two stars on the packet after they may in any other case have 4 warning indicators. Equally, a comfortable drink that ought to have a excessive warning in sugar as an alternative will get two stars. Which means that the system permits all these meals to be some degree of wholesome.
| Picture Credit score: The Hindu
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s name to deal with weight problems and the 2025 Financial Survey’s suggestion of imposing a ‘well being tax’ on ultra-processed meals (UPFs) to curb their consumption are each laudable. However these efforts threat being derailed by India’s ambiguous, industry-friendly, and subjective meals advertising and marketing rules. In India, one in 4 grownup women and men are overweight and one in 4 adults are both diabetic or pre-diabetic (Nationwide Household Well being Survey-5). This underlines the urgency of the issue.
Proper to Data responses and official communications expose how varied Ministries and the Meals Security and Requirements Authority of India (FSSAI) haven’t been in a position to implement the labelling or promoting rules deliberate in 2017 and proceed to depend on rules which are ambiguous and subjective in nature. No marvel there are such a lot of ads of UPFs, and no front-of-pack labels but.
Labelling and promoting
In September 2022, the FSSAI proposed the Indian Vitamin Ranking, a ‘well being star’ labelling system modelled on Australia’s not-so-successful framework, which was developed by a meals {industry} technologist. On this system, half a star implies that the meals is ‘least wholesome’ and 5 stars implies that it qualifies as ‘healthiest’. Proper to Data responses affirm that the FSSAI relied on an IIM Ahmedabad research to justify the score system — a research it by no means critically evaluated. Worse, meals {industry} representatives dominated key stakeholder conferences and members of the scientific panel had been sidelined. The entire course of sided with {industry}, as a member of the stakeholder group identified. Furthermore, the FSSAI ignored its personal 2021 draft rules indicating ‘visitors gentle’ colour-coded and obligatory warning labels and as an alternative bowed all the way down to {industry} lobbying.
The Indian Vitamin Ranking system is flawed as a result of the celebs, at finest, can mislead customers by making a well being halo on all pre-packaged unhealthy meals merchandise. The system permits meals excessive in fats, salt and sugar (HFSS) and UPFs, equivalent to biscuits, flaunt two stars on the packet after they may in any other case have 4 warning indicators. Equally, a comfortable drink that ought to have a excessive warning in sugar as an alternative will get two stars. Corn flakes, which is is excessive in sugar and sodium, will get 3 stars. Which means that the system permits all these meals to be some degree of wholesome.
Globally, warning labels that say the product is excessive in sugar/salt or dangerous fat permit customers to know the true nature of the product and make a alternative. A lot of the front-of-pack labels in use at the moment are warning labels. For example, Chile’s black ‘excessive in’ labels diminished consumption of UPFs by 24%. The repair is due to this fact to make sure that front-of-pack labels are notified quickly and change stars with obligatory ‘excessive in’ warnings on HFSS meals and UPFs, based mostly on the World Well being Group’s tips or the Nationwide Institute of Vitamin’s Dietary Guideline for Indians.
India has 4 legal guidelines to curb deceptive promoting for HFSS/ UPFs however none of them is efficient, in line with stories and knowledge. The Nationwide Multisectoral Motion Plan, 2017, known as for an modification to those legal guidelines to incorporate restrictions on ads on HFSS meals, however no regulatory motion has been taken up to now.
Present rules are ambiguous and subjective. The Client Safety Act, 2019, defines as ‘deceptive’ any services or products that intentionally conceals vital info. If we interpret vital info to be about fats/sugar or salt, FSSAI doesn’t agree. FSS rules nowhere specify that dietary info of a meals product should be offered within the commercial. Which means that a cola drink can goal folks, particularly kids and youth, with out disclosing that the drink comprises 9-10 teaspoons of sugar per bottle. FSS rules are but to offer a definition of HFSS or UPFs and thresholds past which these shall be regulated.
The result’s continued freedom to promote unhealthy addictive meals merchandise throughout media. This places folks susceptible to weight problems and diabetes. Research present that if rules banning junk meals are carried out, it could reduce the speed of childhood weight problems considerably.
The trail ahead
The Financial Survey rightly calls for stringent front-of-pack labels and stricter advertising and marketing curbs. To realize this, India must take the next steps. First, it must scrap the Indian Vitamin Ranking system and undertake warning labels. Second, there should be clear sugar/salt/fats limits for HFSS meals. The World Well being Group’s SEARO tips and the Indian Council of Medical Analysis-Nationwide Institute of Vitamin tips supply a template. Third, promoting loopholes have to be closed via the modification of current legal guidelines or the enactment of a brand new one harmonising all legal guidelines below a unified UPF/HFSS commercial ban. Fourth, the federal government may take into account launching a marketing campaign on the dangers of UPFs in all languages.
India’s weight problems disaster shouldn’t be a public failure however a coverage failure. The Financial Survey presents a street map to rectify this. With out pressing motion, the plan to halt weight problems by 2025 is not going to achieve success. The Prime Minister’s imaginative and prescient of a wholesome India calls for greater than rhetoric; India wants a regulatory method that doesn’t sacrifice kids’s well being for company revenue. The ideas within the Financial Survey can break the cycle to attain the Prime Minister’s imaginative and prescient. It’s for the coverage makers to point out urgency and can.
Dr. Arun Gupta, pediatrician, public well being skilled, and convenor of the Vitamin Advocacy in Public Curiosity. He’s a former member of the PM’s Council on India’s Dietary Challenges
Printed – March 11, 2025 01:38 am IST
