FSSAI has finally released  that drinks with fruit juice quantity below 10% but not less than 5%, and 2.5% in case of lime or lemon, should be called carbonated beverage with fruit juice.

Fizzy Drinks

This is part of the 11th amendment of the Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards and Food Additives) regulations, 2016. “… in such cases the requirement of TSS (total soluble solids) shall not apply and the quantity of fruit juice shall be declared on the label,” the FSSAI notification, which came through The Gazette of India dated 25 October and was uploaded on FSSAI’s website on 1 November, read. TSS determines the quality of fruit juice content in beverages.

Before this, FSSAI guidelines on aerated beverages did not define carbonated fruit beverages and there was no set standard that the industry could have followed. In June, the food regulator had released a draft notification, defining ‘carbonated fruit beverages or carbonated fruit drinks’, seeking views from industry within two months.

The definition of fruit-based carbonated beverages came more than two years after Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged multinational carbonated beverages companies like Coca-Cola and PepsiCo to mix natural fruit juice (at least 5%) in aerated beverages to help augment fruit sales for Indian farmers. “Millions of people buy Pepsi and Coke. I have asked these companies if they can put 5% natural juice in their drinks,” Modi had said in September 2014.

Coca-Cola India, the local arm of American beverage maker Coca-Cola Co., already sells Fanta Green Mango, a carbonated drink that has 10.4% fruit content. Rival PepsiCo India Holdings Pvt. Ltd, the local arm of American food and beverages company PepsiCo Inc, sells Nimbooz Masala Soda, a juice-based (5% lemon juice) aerated beverage.

While Coca-Cola started piloting with Fanta Green Mango about a year after Modi’s speech, PepsiCo had launched Nimbooz Masala Soda nationally in the summer of 2015.

Both Coca-Cola and PepsiCo have been working on more fruit-based carbonated beverages and were waiting for FSSAI to come out with clear guidelines. Both the companies have plans to launch more products in the category over the next few years, Mint reported on 22 July.

Source : Economic Times