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P.T. Jyothi Datta

New Delhi , Oct. 8

FROM pesticides in beverages to worms in chocolates, the subject of food safety could not have come at a more opportune time - even as the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) goes in for its next hearing on the pesticide-residue issue on Thursday.

And while chocolates may not be on JPC's agenda tomorrow, the industry's plea to look at the big picture on food standards does not seem to have gone entirely unheard.

The Union Health Ministry has extended by three months, up to December 31, the date to hear the industry's viewpoint on the proposed norms for pesticide residue in water-based beverages. Food companies were to have responded to the Government's proposed norms by September 26, - one month after the draft notification had been circulated by the Union Health Ministry.

However, the industry had expressed its unhappiness over adopting the pesticide residue limits for water, as set by the European Union norms as the final parameter for packaged ready-to-serve beverages.

Whether it is because of the JPC already going through the issue or be it in response to the industry's intensive lobbying - the extension of the last date is significant. "The final notification will possibly be out only after the JPC provides direction on the issue. We are hoping that the JPC report will be holistic enough, not only to keep the proposed pesticide residue norms for beverages in abeyance, but also put the brakes on similar norms for water. The latter is to come into effect on January 1, 2004," industry representatives told Business Line.

"The proposed amendment will affect the whole beverage industry including fruit juices and fruit drinks, mostly manufactured at small-scale units and the number of such units run in thousands. The combined annual turnover of the industry that would be affected by the notification is over Rs 40,000 crore and the number of jobs at stake runs into many thousands," the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) had said in a recent letter to Ms Sushma Swaraj, Union Health Minister.

Another industry representative said, "Even before the pesticides in soft drinks controversy, the industry was deliberating on the issue with the Pesticide Residue Committee, under the Central Committee on Food Standards (CCFS). When the controversy came to the fore, the Government should have said it was already deliberating the issue. Stringent norms and better implementation should be brought in keeping in view the Indian environment. The Government's hurry in adopting EU norms for water and proposing the same for soft drinks is confusing."

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