India formulates safety code for vegan food

India has formulated food safety standards for vegan food which includes introduction of a new logo to identify vegan food packets and proper licensing for vegan food manufacturers.

The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has formulated draft Food Safety and Standards (Vegan Food) Regulations 2021. The draft regulations will define vegan food for the first time in India and introduce safety regulations and labelling rules to identify vegan food products. Vegan food will be defined as “those foods or food ingredients that have not made use of any ingredients, additives and processing aids of animal origin including milk and milk products, fish, poultry and meat, egg or egg products, honey or honey bee products, materials of insect origin like silk, dyes, chitin/chitosan etc or ingredients that are clarified using animal sourced products e.g., bone char used in sugar bleaching, isinglass in clarifying beer etc.”

The regulations propose that vegan food will not be tested on animals for evaluating final product safety.