Food Adulteration: Meaning, Types, Methods & Detection

Food adulteration is defined as the degradation of food quality either by combining or replacing it with poor ingredients or substances. In other terms, adulteration refers to the addition of ingredients that are not legally permitted in their preparation.

• One of the most common examples of adulteration is the addition of water to milk
• In India, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) regulates the quality of food sold in the market.
• FSSAI is a statutory body that regulates the manufacture, sale, storage, distribution, and import of food products.
• Any food having the FSSAI approval is unlikely to be adulterated. 

What is Food Adulteration?

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Food adulteration refers to the action of degrading the quality of food by adding one or more substances called adulterants. It also includes removing one or more valuable ingredients from food. This practice is done to increase the quantity of the material, usually for greater profit.

• This practice has been a global issue compromising food quality and safety and comes under criminal offense.
• It not only results in significant health problems but also undermines consumer trust.
• Adulteration can be intentional as well as unintentional due to one’s carelessness, lack of awareness, and ignorance.

Food Adulteration 

Types of Food Adulteration

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There are different types of food adulteration namely:

1. Intentional
2. Incidental
3. Packaging Hazards
4. Metallic

Intentional Adulteration

Intentional Adulteration includes degrading the food quality intentionally by adding substances that are not considered safe for consumption.

• This type of practice is followed in order to make a profit in business.
• Selling adulterated food is a punishable offense and has a penalty of 6 months of imprisonment.

Incidental Adulteration

Incidental Adulteration occurs unintentionally while handling food. 

• This can include tranfer of plastic pieces in food while packaging.
• Traces of pesticides in crops, or mites in cereals or pulses.

Packaging Hazards

Packaging Hazards includes the risks that come from the method of packaging.

• This can be the transfer of chemicals from the packaging material to the food.
• Improper packaging or transfer of physical substances into the food causing spoilage.

Metallic

Addition of metallic substances like lead, mercury, etc happens unintentionally or intentionally while food processing.

• For example, broken pieces of metal blades in food which might have entered while mixing.
• This may cause serious health problems.

What are Adulterants?

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‘Adulterants’ are defined as undesirable or foreign materials that degrade food quality by making it unsafe for consumption. An adulterated food item can be dangerous as it may deprive the essential nutrients for our growth and bodily functions and can be toxic, exerting harmful effects on one or more organs of the body.

• These adulterants can be found in almost every product that we consume on a daily basis.
• For example, addition of chalk in milk to increase its solid content or addition of rice syrup in honey.

Examples of Food Adulterants

The table below shows the various examples of food adulterants and their harmful effects:

Why is Food Adulteration Done?

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Food adulteration is a major concern around the world and is a great threat to food safety and consumer health. There are various factors that contribute as to why food adulteration is done and are mentioned below: 

• Adulteration is practised as a part of business strategy for better profit and revenue.
• It is also done to attract consumers by using low ingredients and selling in low prices.
• To increase the quantity of food item for sales and production.
• Producers use low-grade ingredients when they there is a shortage of high-quality ingredients.
• Practiced for bulk production.

Methods of Food Adulteration

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Adulteration can be performed by several ways like mixing, substituting, removing, etc. In this section, we will discuss the commonly used methods of food adulteration.

• Mixing: Mixing of undesirable items such as glass pellets, sand, chalk powder, metals, sand, wood shavings, etc. to grains, pulses, and other crops.
• Substitution: Replacing high quality and valuable ingredients with low quality ones to increase weight or nature of food.
• Addition of toxic materials:Adding chemical dyes to attract customers and addition of non-permitted preservatives.
• Decomposed food addition: Mixing decomposed vegetables or fruits with fresh ones.

Risk of Food Adulteration

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The risks of Food Adulteration can be severe, it may cause serious health problems both in the long term as well as short term. Some of the major risks are mentioned below:

• Adulterants present in the food may trigger stomach issues, liver or kidney damage, cardiac problems along with other health ailments.
• The addition of food colors or artificial flavors may cause dizziness, headaches, fatigue, etc.
• Some of the adulterants are carcinogenic, for example metanil yellow dyes and other artificial food coloring.
• Prolonged consumption of such carcinogens may cause cancer.
• The nutritional values can get altered thus leading to a deficiency of essential nutrients in the body.

Note: According to recent reports, FSSAI has banned the use of ethylene oxide, a chemical which has been detected as a carcinogen.

Detection of Food Adulteration

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Detection of adulterants is a crucial step in combating food adulteration. Several methods are used to detect adulterants in food materials such as chemical detection, chromatography, radiation methods, pH test, etc.

• Many techniques require prior sample preparation and involve high-end technologies.
• FSSAI has introduced ‘Detect Adulteration with Rapid Tests’ or DART which is a booklet consisiting of several quick adulteration tests.
• These tests can be performed at home without the need of high-end technologies.
• Purity tests for milk and milk products, oils and fats, spices, seeds, honey, etc, are mentioned in this booklet.

FSSAI

Prevention of Food Adulteration

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• Always buy products carrying FSSAI or other competent authority’s certification or label with license number, ingredient lists, date of manufacture, and date of expiration.
• A thorough wash of fruits and vegetables is required before consumption.
• Dark coloured food, junk food, and processed food should be avoided.
• Always check for the seal of the package before purchase of any item.
• Try purchasing cereals, grains or pulses from local markets.
• Use spices that are freshly grounded at home to avoid chances of contaminated product. 

Things to Remember

• Food adulteration can be defined as the practice to add or remove ingredients from food debasing their quality.
• It is practised to increase the quantity of the material usually for greater profit.
• Incidental contamination during growth, harvesting, transportation or distribution is also considered adulteration.
• Prevention of food adulteration act 1954, was passed to ensure pure wholesome food to the consumers.
• Iodine test is used to check the purity of chilli powder.

Previous Year's Questions

1. By which of the following methods, new and better varieties of plants can be formed?…[Neet 2015]
2. A protoplast is a cell...[WBJEE 2009]
3. A technique of micropropagation is...[Neet 2015]
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8. Green revolution in India occurred during….[Neet 2012]
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