The Agriculture, Cooperatives and Natural Resources Committee of the House of Representatives on Friday approved a bill on food purity and quality with stern penalties for the producers and sellers of substandard and adulterated foods.

The bill, endorsed by the National Assembly in August 2021, will be presented to the House for approval. Registered by the government in July 2020, it was endorsed by the Assembly a year later and was passed on to the House of Representatives.

“The bill is ready to be tabled in the House,” said Hridaya Ram Maharjan, the committee secretary.

Passed unanimously by the committee, the bill is sure to get through the lower house and come into force. Once in effect, those producing and selling substandard and adulterated foods can face a maximum of five years in jail and upto half a million rupees in fines. The penalty is significantly higher than the action prescribed by the prevailing Food Act, which sets a maximum penalty of six months in prison and Rs5,000 in fines.

The bill seeks to ban the import and export of poor-quality food items and would set a penalty of three years behind bars and fines.

One of the clauses in the bill says the testing of food items must be completed within 15 days and the report made public the next day to enable prompt action. Bir Bahadur Balayar, a member of the House committee, said as the bill is endorsed, they have also directed the government to start drafting the regulation so that the provisions come into force immediately.

“Since food is a sensitive issue, we want the law to be implemented promptly,” said Balayar, who also coordinated a sub-panel of the House committee.

In several instances, laws are not implemented as the government delays the formulation of necessary regulations. The food purity and quality law will come into effect within 91 days, with the presidential seal.

Arzu Rana Deuba, chairperson of the committee, said at Friday's meeting that the bill was endorsed after a long discussion among the lawmakers and stakeholders. In the interactions, consumer rights activists suggested that while the bill has impressive provisions, it cannot be implemented in the given set-up and with the human resource available.

They suggested adding testing labs and increasing the number of food inspectors and technicians. If the new bill becomes law, food inspectors will have to shoulder the responsibility of ensuring that foodstuffs produced and sold in the market are safe for consumption. The new legislation also authorises inspectors to control the production, import and supply of food, and collect food samples for lab testing.

They can also investigate and collect information regarding suspicious food items from the producer or the supplier. In collaboration with the local administration or the local government, they can halt the supply of food that can harm public.

However, there is an acute shortage of food inspectors in the market for the nearly 30 million Nepalis. The Department of Food Technology and Quality Control employs just 30 food inspectors—one for every million population—to cover the whole country.

Balayar said though the bill doesn't specify the numbers, it envisions having adequate numbers of food inspectors and analysts to ensure proper surveillance of food available to buy. The bill says the provincial and local administrations can conduct quality monitoring, he said. “They can pass their own laws and hire technical experts.”