The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has decided to extend the date for mandatory food safety audit of food businesses under the FSS (Food Safety Auditing) Regulations 2018.

FSSAI, in an order, has stated that the food businesses holding Central licences and falling under high risk category can now complete the mandatory audit by Sept 30, 2020.

“For the order mandating audit of food businesses holding Central licences falling under high risk category, it is informed that keeping in view the current situation due to Covid pandemic, the last date for mandatory audits has been extended up to Sept 30, 2020,” reads the order adding that accordingly, the food businesses were directed to get such mandatory audit of their premises conducted by the said date.

Earlier, in its order dated August 13, 2019, the food authority had directed food businesses including dairy products and analogues (excluding products of food category 2.0); meat and meat products, including poultry; fish and fish products, including molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms; eggs and egg products; foodstuffs intended for particular nutritional uses (food for infant nutrition and so on); and prepared food (catering and so on), shall be subject to mandatory food safety auditing.

Previously the last date for conducting mandatory audit was December 31, 2019, which was extended to June 30, 2020.