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FSSAI has proposed mandatory front-of-pack warning labels for packaged foods high in sugar, salt and saturated fat, setting out the plan in an affidavit before the Supreme Court.
The warnings would appear as bold red hexagonal symbols reading HIGH FAT, HIGH SUGAR, HIGH SALT or HIGHLY SWEETENED BEVERAGE on the principal display panel.
Nutrient thresholds are aligned with the Dietary Guidelines for Indians, 2024, issued by ICMR-NIN.
Phase I covers products crossing thresholds for two or more target nutrients; Phase II extends it to products crossing even one.
The proposal replaces FSSAI's earlier plan for a star-rating system, the Indian Nutrition Rating, which had failed to build stakeholder consensus.
Every packaged food already carries a nutrition information table on the back listing energy, fat, sugar, protein and sodium per 100 g. That is informative labelling: it reports numbers and leaves the judgement to the shopper. Front-of-pack labelling is interpretive - it converts those numbers into a verdict the buyer can read in a second. Two broad families exist. Summary systems, such as star ratings or traffic lights, score the product as a whole. Warning systems, such as Chile's black octagons or the red hexagons FSSAI now proposes, flag only the nutrients that exceed a threshold and make no attempt to rate the food overall. Warning labels are generally found to change purchasing behaviour more sharply, because a single red mark is harder to rationalise away than a two-and-a-half-star score.
Simple Analogy: The back-of-pack table is a bank statement; a warning label is the red 'insufficient funds' stamp across the top of it.
GS Paper 2 > Issues Relating to Health, Statutory Bodies and Government Policies; GS Paper 3 > Food Processing
General Awareness > Current Affairs and Indian Polity
General Awareness > Current Affairs
General Awareness > Current Affairs
The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, the statutory regulator constituted under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, functioning under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
Nutrition labelling placed on the principal display panel of a packaged food to convey nutrient information at a glance.
The half-star to five-star summary rating proposed in FSSAI's 2022 draft regulations, now superseded by the warning-label proposal.
The Indian Council of Medical Research's National Institute of Nutrition, which issued the Dietary Guidelines for Indians, 2024.
A petition allowing any public-spirited person or body to move a constitutional court on behalf of those unable to approach it themselves.