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The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has introduced a new rule amid growing complaints of adulteration of basmati rice that come into effect on August 1, 2023.

For the first time, the Food Regulatory Authority of India has decided to impose certain regulatory standards on basmati rice to curb the spread of adulterated rice. According to several affidavits, traders mixed substandard rice with basmati rice, polished it and used chemicals to improve the appearance and smell of basmati rice to increase profits.

The new rules will set standards regarding the average size, moisture and uric acid content and condition of basmati rice after cooking.

What rules did FSSAI implement?

• The exporter must maintain the basmati perfume.
• All kinds of dyes, polishes and artificial fragrances are strictly prohibited.
• The regulations apply to all basmati rice, whether sold in India or exported.
• The regulations apply to brown basmati rice, milled (parboiled) basmati or semi-cooked basmati.

Among other measures, it was also ruled that the proportion of non-basmati varieties should not exceed 15% by mass, broken grains 5% and damaged grains 1%.

Basmati rice has been cultivated for thousands of years in the fertile alluvial plains between the Indus and the Ganges. To be considered basmati, the grains must meet certain criteria, such as aroma, length and width, and cooked texture. They must also contain moderate levels of amylose, which is necessary for making some traditional Indian dishes such as coconut basmati rice.

Compared to other countries, the quality of rice exported from India ranks first. Indian basmati is exported to the USA, Iran, Yemen and many other countries. Pakistan ranks second, followed by Vietnam, and the combined exports of these two countries account for only half of India’s exports.

An inconvenient with a long history

In 1900’s, scammers became notorious for cutting basmati rice with inferior grains, lured by the fact that it was 50% more expensive per kilo. A few decades ago, it was not uncommon for imported basmati rice to contain more than 50% impurities.

To address this, the UK Rice Board introduced a code of good practice in 2005. The standard is also observed across the European Union, which limits basmati to 7% impurities and introduces a list of 15 permitted varieties: nine traditional varieties could be imported duty-free and six modern varieties.

A DNA fingerprinting system was developed at Bangor University for code enforcement, sometimes leading to prosecutions for infringements.

In 2017, 25 new modern rice variants were added to the system and some code segments were updated. This was followed by a wave of new breeders in the 2000s and 2010s to address the problem of low yield and high growth of traditional basmati varieties, which tended to stagnate if over-fertilized.

These breeders solved this problem by cross-selecting to add a plant growth retardation gene, which has also been introduced into most modern rice varieties of the highest quality. However, it could be shown that this improvement was not entirely true.

By developing alternative DNA markers for fingerprinting, it was shown that six of the new varieties – five from India and one from Pakistan – had not been properly bred for fragrance. Some did not even contain the version of the BADH2 gene that made basmati fragrance possible.

Fish regulations

The FSSAI notification also sets an upper limit for formaldehyde, a substance identified by the International Agency for Research on Cancer as a potential carcinogen that occurs naturally in some fish but is also used illegally to extend the shelf life of fish.

The FSSAI stipulates that naturally occurring formaldehyde should not exceed 4 mg/kg in marine and freshwater fish, 8 mg/kg in crocodiles and 100 mg/kg in all frozen and stored marine fish products.