The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) is an independent statutory authority responsible for the enforcement of various provisions of the Food Safety and Standards Act and Rules in the States. In Kerala, the Commissioner of Food Safety (Commissioner) under the Health and Family Welfare Department was appointed in July 2008 for implementation of the Act in the State. The Compliance Audit was conducted from January 2021 to September 2021 covering the period 2016-21.

Efficient implementation of the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006 in the State suffered from deficiencies relating to various stages of implementation such as licensing and registration, inspection and sample collection, food analysis and monitoring. Monitoring by the department was insufficient as reflected in the absence of mechanism to follow up on Food Business Operators (FBO) whose licences had expired, non-adherence to the norms for inspection of registered FBOs etc. There was delay in issue of licences and registrations by the Food Safety Department. Comparison of database of FBOs maintained by the Food Safety Department with similar data available with other Government agencies/ LSGIs revealed that a large number of FBOs remained outside the ambit of monitoring by the Department. Providing registration instead of licences to FBOs had resulted in revenue loss to the State. The Designated officers did not prescribe the periodicity for inspecting licensed FBOs and the provisions of inspecting all registered FBOs annually were not adhered to by the Department. The Department could not ensure that non-conforming products did not reach the public. The FSSAI notified laboratories in the State were not NABL accredited for all the parameters and are not equipped to test all the parameters essential for declaring a particular food sample as safe. The laboratories entrusted with the function of testing offerings at Sabarimala temple and the raw materials used in making of offerings were declaring the food as safe without testing all required parameters. The recovery of penalty and compounding charges from erring FBOs was in arrears. There was shortfall in utilising funds for IEC activities meant for creating awareness about provisions of the Food Safety Act/ Rules/ Regulations.