Indian flyers likely to get nutritional facts of meals served on board

Flyers will now get full information about the food they get on their tray. The information will include, the food's nutritional aspects like calories, list of contents. According to a Times of India report, India’s food regulator FSSAI  started examining the food served on the plane after the deteriorating in-flight meal quality in most airlines has become a common concern of the flyers now. This includes the transportation of meals, storage on board, and then how it is being served. It is now coming out with guidelines for the entire process of the in-flight catering. 
 
FSSAI CEO Pawan Kumar Agarwal recently called a meeting with airlines, flight caterers and airport operators to discuss these issues. “The public, at several fora, has expressed concerns about airline food, its quality and safety. Earlier we called meetings with airlines operators, in-flight caterers separately who would say this is the other’s area. So we met everyone together to cover all aspects of safety, hygiene of in-flight food and are going to come out with standard operating procedure (SOPs) for each step involved to ensure what is served to passengers is perfectly safe to consumers. The process has begun and the aviation industry has been very welcoming towards this initiative,” Agarwal, a 1985 batch IAS officer of West Bengal cadre, said, as cited by TOI. 
 
According to the report, India's leading hospitality chains, who cook and pack the food for the airlines might be asked to give full details of the meals and also have make the food that will be served visible to the flyers. This would ensure the flyers what exactly they are getting on their plates and whether the food is safe.
 
FSSAI also wants all the full-service carriers and the budget carriers to sell the meals trays on board with labels that have best before date and contents, just like the way the low-cost carriers sell packaged items like sandwiches and snacks on the flight.