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FSSAI notifies revised camel milk stds; Value of fat content down to 2%
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Thursday, 08 June, 2017, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Shraddha Joshi, Mumbai
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Keeping in view the average composition of domestic camel breed milk, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), after its recent meeting, has notified the revised standards for camel milk, which were operationalised recently. The new standards prescribed that the value of fat and milk solids not fat (SNF) content of camel milk be brought down to two and six per cent, respectively.
In the past, the country’s apex food regulator had received requests from several quarters for the inclusion of camel milk under the Food Safety and Standards Regulations, 2011. Considering the fact that several food business operators (FBOs) have started producing camel milk and in order to facilitate trade, FSSAI operationalised the standards for it.
Based on the recommendation received by FSSAI’s task force on milk and milk products, it framed the standards specifying the minimum content of milk fat to three per cent and milk solids not fat to 6.5 per cent in camel milk. The draft notification regarding the same was published on November 2016, and was operationalised with effect from November 29, 2016.
“However, after the stakeholders’ consultation, new standards has been revised to bring down the milk fat, which was three per cent, to two percent and milk solids-no-fat from 6.5 per cent to six per cent,” said FSSAI in a statement.
In the Food Safety and Standards (Food Product Standards and Food Additives) Regulations, 2011, in regulations 2.1 relating to dairy products and analogues, in Sub-regulation 2.1.1, in the table:
Before the words mixed milk in column (1) and their respective entries in columns (2), (3), (4) and (5), the following shall be inserted, namely:
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Class of milk
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Designation
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Locality
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Milk fat
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Minimum per cent milk solids not fat
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(1)
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(2)
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(3)
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(4)
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(5)
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Camel milk
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Raw,
pasteurised, boiled, flavoured and sterilised
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All India
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2
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6
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Welcoming the revised standards, Valamjibhai Humbal, chairman, Sarhad Dairy, Gujarat, said, “Camel milk is not rich in fat content, compared to that of cows, buffaloes or goats. Producing milk with three per cent fat from camel milk is a tough job. It needs to be processed twice to top up the additional cream and maintain three per cent fat.”
He added, “The average fat content observed in camel is approximately 2.7 per cent in the Kutch region of Gujarat. After the revision in FSSAI standards for camel milk, it will be easier to process camel milk for the industry without any additional efforts to maintain the standard of two per cent fat.”
It is mainly two states, Gujarat and Rajasthan, which produce camel milk. The producers planned to sell the camel milk through organised market across India.
“Following the new standards, processed camel milk in PET bottles can be priced around Rs 80 per litre,” Humbal added.
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