An Essay on Food Adulteration

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Food Adulteration

            For many years, we have been buying our basic items from the local store, usually referred to us by the ‘kirana’ shops. A common sight in India, kirana shops were places where we would get all items of our daily needs. As the Indian population increased and as technology advanced, kirana shops gave way to ‘supermarkets’, ‘grocery stores’ and the latest, ‘shopping malls’ and ‘hyper-city’.

            A wide variety of products are available today at these shops, some branded and some old as ‘loose’, meaning products not labeled by the manufacturer. The consumer wants to get the maximum quantity for a price as low as possible. The sellers have to meet the needs of the buyers in order for them to exist. This is a vicious cycle. When the price of the food product is higher than the price which the consumer is prepared to pay, the seller is compelled to supply a product of inferior quality. Thus, adulteration occurs.

WHAT IS ADULTERATION ?

            Adulteration is addition of a non food item to increase the weight/quantity of the food item in raw form of prepared form, which may result in the loss of actual quality of food item. Adulteration of food may endanger health if the physiological functions of the consumer are affected due to either addition of a substance or the removal of a vital component.

            An adulterant is any material which is employed or which could be employed for the purpose of adulteration. It was to check such malpractices that the first central act called the prevention of ‘Food Adulteration Act’ was passed in 1954 and came into force from June - 1 – 1995. The PFA requires that foods be pure, wholesome and honestly labeled.

            According to the PFA Act, food adulteration includes:

Intentional addition, substitution or abstraction or substances which adversely affect the purity and quality of foods, for e.g. addition of water to milk and removal of fat from milk. Incidental contamination of foods with deleterious substances such as toxins and insecticides due to ignorance, negligence or lack of proper storage facilities. Contamination of food with harmful insects, micro organisms, like bacteria, fungus, moulds etc during production, storage and handling.

TYPES OF ADULTERATION

Adulteration is of two types:  1 - Intentional and 2 – Unintentional

1 – Intentional adulteration is a willful act on the part of the adulterator intended to increase the margin of profit i.e. addition or removing of substances from a product on purpose. Intentional adulterants are sand, marble chips, stones, mud, chalk powder, water, mineral oil, dyes, and coal tar. These adulterants cause harmful effects on the body. It is observed that as much as 25% - 30% of edibles sold in the market are intentionally adulterated.

2 – Incidental adulteration (unintentional) ,is usually due to ignorance, negligence or lack of proper facilities. Unintentional adulteration is the result of spilling of chemicals such as pesticides, fertilizers and even during early stages when insects enter crops in farms. Some of the examples are toxic varieties of pulses, mushrooms, green and other vegetables, fish and sea foods. It is estimated that about 5,000 species of marine fish are known to be poisonous, and many of these are among edible varieties.