FSSAI cracks down on 100% fruit juice claims

The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has issued a directive that mandated all Food Business Operators (FBOs) to remove any 100% fruit juice claim from the labels and advertisements of reconstituted fruit juices, effective immediately. The FBOs have also been told to exhaust all pre-printed packaging materials before 1 September 2024.

A statement issued by FSSAI said, “It has come to the notice of FSSAI that several Food Business Operators are selling/marketing various types of reconstituted fruit juices by claiming it as 100% on their label.”

The FSSAI’s statement said that all products covered by the Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards & Food Additives) Regulation 2011 have to be labelled in accordance with the Food Safety and Standards (Labelling and Display) Regulations, 2020.

Specifically, in the ingredient list, the word “reconstituted” must be mentioned against the name of the juice that is reconstituted from the concentrate. “Additionally, if added nutritive sweeteners exceed 15 gm/kg, the product must be labelled as ‘sweetened juice’,” the regulator said.

The onus will be on consumers to check before buying. Also an opportunity for label converters to manufacture new labels; since FBOs have ordered companies to use up existing packaging by 1 September 2024.  

An industry specialist shared with WhatPackaging? magazine, “Ultimately all this needs to be implemented by the food brands. Last year FSSAI issued a directive to food vendors and ordered them not to sell food items in a newspaper.” The reason is that the printing ink deployed in newspapers it “contained bioactive materials like lead and heavy metal which could contaminate food but the on-ground implementation is poor.”