Precautions while buying Food Articles

  • Ensure that details like Manufacturing date, Best before/Use by/Expire date, Batch number/Lot Number, FSSAI License number, Name and Address of the Manufacturer/Importer, Name of origin country for Importer, List of Ingredient, Nutritional fact information are mentioned on the label of any packed food article.
  • Powdered Spices should be always in packed condition.
  • infant milk food, infant formula and milk cereal based weaning food, processed cereal based weaning food, Packaged drinking water & mineral water, food colours should have BIS mark.
  • Condensed milk sweetened, condensed skimmed milk sweetened, milk powder, skimmed milk powder, partly skimmed milk powder and partly skimmed sweetened condensed milk shall not be bought except under Indian Standards Institution Certification (BIS) Mark.
  • Do not consume very brightly unnatural coloured and polished food article such as fruit, vegetable, Black pepper etc.
  • Ensure that adequate provision have been made to protect food articles such as open sweets, cut fruits from infection spread by house flies, mosquitoes and other insects.
  • Every package of vegetarian food article should bear the symbol of a green sphere covered by a square with green coloured sides (.green image).
  • Every package of a non vegetarian food article should bear the symbol of a chocolate coloured sphere covered by a square with same coloured sides.
  • Beware of artificial ripening of fruits – An artificially ripened fruit will have patches and unnatural bright colour unlikely naturally ripened fruits. The artificially ripened fruit will look completely ripe from outside but it will not be so inside.
  • The Fresh Fruits and Vegetables shall be free from rotting and free from coating of waxes, mineral oil and colours. Fresh fruits may be coated with bees wax (white and yellow) or carnauba wax or shellac wax at level not exceeding Good Manufacturing Practices under proper label declaration as provided in Regulation 2.4.5 (44) of Food Safety and Standards (Packaging and Labelling) regulations, 2011.
  • The Blended Edible Vegetable Oils shall not be bought in loose form. It shall be bought in sealed package weighing not more than 15 litres. The container having blended edible vegetable oil shall be tamper proof. It shall also not be bought under the common or generic name of the oil used in the blend but shall be sold as “Blended Edible Vegetable Oil”. The sealed package shall be sold or offered for sale only under AGMARK certification mark bearing the label declarations as provided in the Regulations besides other labelling requirements under the Regulation 2.4.2 of Food Safety and Standards (Packaging and Labelling) regulations, 2011.