{"id":35287,"date":"2023-05-09T09:03:48","date_gmt":"2023-05-09T03:33:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=35287"},"modified":"2025-04-20T23:26:45","modified_gmt":"2025-04-20T17:56:45","slug":"regulations-for-tackling-misleading-ads-and-claims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/regulations-for-tackling-misleading-ads-and-claims\/","title":{"rendered":"Regulations for Tackling Misleading Ads and Claims"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>What\u2019s in today\u2019s article?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Why in News?<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>What has been Observed in the Food Advertising Ecosystem in India?\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Some Misleading Words in the Food Advertising Ecosystem in India<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Regulations for Tackling Misleading Ads and Claims<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Way Ahead<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Why in News?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>The Advertisement Monitoring Committee at the <strong>Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) <\/strong>flagged 32 fresh cases of food business operators (FBOs) making misleading claims and advertisements.<\/li>\n<li>They were found to be in contravention of the Food Safety and Standards (Advertisements &amp; Claims) Regulations, 2018.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<h2><strong>What has been Observed in the Food Advertising Ecosystem in India?\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>FSSAI seeks that the advertisements and claims be <strong>truthful, unambiguous, meaningful, not misleading and help consumers <\/strong>to comprehend the information provided.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Claims must be scientifically substantiated<\/strong> by validated methods of characterising or quantifying the ingredient or substance that is the basis for the claim.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>According to the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), food advertising has been a <strong>\u201cfairly violative sector\u201d<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Last month, an uproar ensued after allegations were made against health drink <strong>Bournvita<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<figure class=\"media\">\n<div data-oembed-url=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=AU-J70TD-3A\">\n<div><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/AU-J70TD-3A\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Some Misleading Words in the Food Advertising Ecosystem in India:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Natural: <\/strong>A food product can be referred to as \u2018natural\u2019 if it is a single food derived from a recognised natural source and has nothing added to it.\u00a0\n<ul>\n<li>Therefore, <strong>composite foods<\/strong> &#8211; a mixture of plant and processed constituents, can be called \u2018made from natural ingredients\u2019 instead of \u2018natural\u2019.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Fresh: <\/strong>It can be used for products which are not processed in any manner other than washing, peeling, chilling, trimming, cutting or irradiation by ionising radiation (not exceeding 1 kGy to delay in ripening, killing of insects\/pests, etc).\u00a0\n<ul>\n<li>The regulations forbid the \u2018fresh\u2019 reference <strong>if the processing endeavours to achieve an extension in the shelf-life<\/strong> of the product (may instead use \u2018fresh frozen\u2019).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Pure and original:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>\u2018Pure\u2019 is to be used for <strong>single-ingredient foods<\/strong> to which nothing has been added and which are devoid of all avoidable contamination.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>\u2018Original\u2019 is used to describe food products<strong> made to a formulation, with a traceable origin <\/strong>that has remained unchanged over time.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Nutritional claims:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>Nutritional claims may either be about the specific contents of a product or comparisons with some other foodstuff.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li><strong>Claims of equivalence <\/strong>such as \u201ccontains the same of (nutrient) as a (food)\u201d or \u201cas much (nutrient) as a (food)\u201d may be used in the labelling.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>According to the ASCI, <strong>most complaints of misleading Ads were related to the nutrition of a product, its benefits and the ingredient mix<\/strong> not being based on adequate evidence.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Regulations for Tackling Misleading Ads and Claims:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>The Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006:<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>It prohibits product claims<\/strong> suggesting suitability for prevention, alleviation, treatment or cure of a disease, disorder or particular psychological condition unless specifically permitted under the Act.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>Making deceptive claims or advertisements are <strong>punishable offences<\/strong> and may invite penalties of up to Rs 10 lakh apart from suspension\/cancellation of licenses for repeated offences.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>The Food Safety and Standards (Advertisements &amp; Claims) Regulations 2018: <\/strong>The focus of the regulation is to make the Companies accountable for their claims on food products and cater to the interest of customers.<\/li>\n<li><strong>The Consumer Protection Act 2019:<\/strong> Under this, Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) was set up as a regulatory body in relation to matters (such as wrong advertisements) affecting rights of consumers.<\/li>\n<li><strong>The Programme and Advertising Codes: <\/strong>These are prescribed under the Cable Television Network Rules 1994 and underlines that advertisements must not give claims which are difficult to be proved.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Way Ahead:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>FBOs must desist<\/strong> from making any unscientific and\/or exaggerated claims and advertisements to promote their product sales to avoid enforcement actions and in larger consumer interest.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>They must be in consonance with principles of <strong>Good Clinical Practices<\/strong> (GCP) and peer-reviewed or <strong>published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3><strong>Q1) What is the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI)?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>The ASCI is a voluntary self-regulatory organization of the advertising industry in India. Established in 1985, ASCI is registered as a non-profit company under section 25 of the Company Act.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Q2) What is the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI)?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>FSSAI is a statutory body established [under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006] under the Ministry of Health &amp; Family Welfare. It is responsible for protecting and promoting public health through the regulation and supervision of food safety.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Source:\u00a0<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/news\/national\/explained-misleading-food-ads-and-regulations-to-curtail-them\/article66815388.ece\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><u>Explained | Misleading food ads and regulations to curtail them<\/u><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Making deceptive claims or advertisements are punishable offences under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":35288,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-35287","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35287"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35287\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}