A day after the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) submitted its compliance affidavit on front-of-pack warning labels, former FSSAI CEO Pawan Kumar Agarwal said he was comfortable with the regulator’s proposed approach, provided the transition period results in meaningful improvements to the nutritional quality of packaged foods.
Agarwal, through the Food Future Foundation, filed an intervention application in the Supreme Court on September 22 in the ongoing case concerning front-of-pack warning labels. The application seeks to assist the court on issues related to the design, scientific basis and implementation of the proposed warning-label system.
The intervention argues that the transition period should encourage companies to progressively reformulate their products rather than simply give them additional time to change packaging.
It proposes introducing interim nutrient thresholds, followed by stricter limits over a three-to-five-year period. The Foundation has also recommended that specific milestones and implementation timelines be announced in advance.
Another recommendation is that a warning should be triggered whenever a product exceeds the prescribed limit for even one nutrient. This would mean, for example, that a beverage exceeding the sugar threshold could not avoid a warning simply because its sodium and saturated-fat levels remain below their respective limits.
Study finds most packaged food products exceed at least one threshold
The intervention cites an analysis by NatFirst of 44,109 barcode records covering packaged and branded food products available at retail outlets in India.
According to the analysis, 94.1% of the records exceeded at least one proposed nutrient threshold. Among products classified as high in fat, sugar and salt, 85.3% exceeded two or more thresholds.
However, the figures are not weighted according to sales or consumption levels. NatFirst has also clarified that the findings do not establish that individual products are unsafe, unhealthy or non-compliant.
The Food Future Foundation has proposed product-level modelling to help establish interim nutrient thresholds and assess their potential impact on warning labels and product reformulation.
FSSAI proposes single-phase implementation
In its September 23 affidavit, FSSAI proposed a single-phase rollout of the front-of-pack warning system.
Under the proposed timeline, around four months would be allocated to finalising the regulations, followed by a 60-day consultation period involving stakeholders and the World Trade Organization. Food businesses would then receive 365 days to implement the new requirements.
The proposed warning label would feature a red hexagon placed on a white square. If a product exceeds the prescribed limit for one nutrient, that nutrient would be identified inside the hexagon. If two or three nutrients cross the limits, they would be listed together.
NAPi seeks separate warnings for each nutrient
The Nutrition Advocacy in Public Interest (NAPi), however, has opposed the proposal to place multiple nutrients within a single warning hexagon.
The organisation has argued that each nutrient should carry a separate warning and has called for larger and more prominent labels, with their size linked to the principal display area of the package.
NAPi has also sought implementation by July 2027 or earlier, rather than 2028.
The organisation has questioned the proposed use of “added sugar” as a criterion and argued that total sugar should also be taken into account.
It cited a communication from the Indian Council of Medical Research-National Institute of Nutrition (ICMR-NIN), which called for the 2024 Dietary Guidelines to be implemented as an integrated framework that considers factors including energy density and overall nutrient levels.
