Food enterprises may have to change printing norms

Packaged food companies in India may soon have to change their printing and packaging norms due to safety issues with certain chemicals currently being used to print labels and packages.

The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) is working to update the current standard (IS 15495) for printing ink for food packaging and several harmful chemicals, including toluene, may be banned with the new standards coming into effect.

Toluene, a chemical used in paint thinners, has been known to cause liver and kidney damage in humans.

It has been banned in the food industry in several countries, while in others such as Sri Lanka; printing associations have voluntarily taken a stand to shun it.

Studies have revealed that toluene can migrate between layers of packaging.

If the new norms are put in place, printing experts said, FMCG companies have to mandate the usage of toluene-free inks in their technical specifications of packaging material to their packaging suppliers. For instance, Swiss food giant Nestle has done the same in certain markets.

“For the packaging suppliers, there is no requirement for any major/capital investment to run toluenefree inks,” said the industry experts.

The current printing equipment, which runs toluene-based inks, can also run toluene-free inks.

It is difficult to estimate the cost implication of this transition as it depends on several factors like type of print job, type of equipment, printing expenditure, apart from ink cost.

It is important to keep in mind that the ink costs are a fraction of the total packaging cost of any product.