The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), the country’s apex food regulator, has decided to make it mandatory for food business operators (FBOs) to declare whether their food products contain any ingredient that is a genetically-modified organism (GMO).

According to sources, FSSAI, which has been working on a comprehensive regulation regarding labelling norms for food products in India, has compiled the draft, which will be put out for stakeholders’ consultations soon.

With these regulations, the debate on GM food labelling, which was raging in the country, and questions about many products that could have been sourced from the GMO crops sold in India, could possibly laid to rest.

FBOs now have to declare it on the labels if their products contain any ingredient which is sourced from GMOs and has at least five per cent presence in the product.

A senior official privy to the development stated, Under the new norms (which will be out soon), FBOs have to label such product mentioning specifically the presence of GMOs, if they contain five per cent of such ingredients.