Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) which is managed by France-headquartered international trade organization Consumer Goods Forum has decided to establish an Indian arm.
Global food companies such as Cargill, Nestle, Coca-Cola, Danone, Tesco, Metro Group and Amazon have come together to form a lobby in India to work with the government, the regulator and academia to ensure food safety so that there is no Maggi-case scenario in the country.
GFSI India wing will have a core team of 20-25 members to start with and will have representatives from most of the firms. It will bring GFSI’s global practices to India and mobilize the local food industry, besides engaging with the regulator and other government authorities regarding food safety issues and practices followed by companies.
GFSI, which was set up under Belgian Law in May in 2000, worked on to improve food safety management systems across the world. GFSI motive is to implement its global strategy at a local level and exchange local knowledge with the global team. At present, GFSI has six local groups—South Latin America, Mexico, Japan, China, Europe and US-Canada.
GFSI’s global board includes representatives from food and food retail firms. Besides this, GFSI has technical working groups and leaders who work for improving food safety management systems globally.