Do you know how many times the oil is re-used to prepare your favourite fried snacks like- samosa, kachori, jilebi, sev, puri, etc?
Do you know Food Business Operators like restaurants, canteens, darshini & dhaba (FBOs) often use the same cooking oil for repeated frying of your favourite samosa, kachori, jilebi, sev, puri, etc?
Do you think what you are eating outside is a good and healthy one?
Let’s go into detail about this.
This is a common practice to heat the oil many times irrespective of its nutritional aspects and effect on our health. Lack of awareness is another contributing factor to this malpractice.
Repeated frying of oil leads to changes in their nutritional, sensory and physicochemical properties and becomes dark by changing in its consistency. Hence, by looking at this hazard, FSSAI has notified the limit of total polar compounds (TPC) to be not more than 25% and beyond that is considered as unsafe for human consumption.
Now, what is TPC?
Total polar compounds (TPC) whose polarity is larger than those of triglycerides are generated from peroxides and hydroperoxides during continuous frying. In simple terms, TPC is used to measure the quality of oil and it increases with the re-heating of oil. The toxicity of these compounds is associated with many health complications like hypertension, atherosclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, liver diseases. Hence, it is important to maintain the quality of oil when using. This can be achieved by avoiding re-heating & reuse oil. Avoid using leftover oil whenever possible.
Food Safety and Standards Authority of India has notified the Food Safety and Standards (Licensing and Registration of Food Businesses) First Amendment Regulation, 2017 w.r.t quality of vegetable oil for repeated frying in the official gazette of India.
From 1st July, 2018 onwards, all Food Business Operators (FBOs) are required to monitor the quality of oil during frying by complying with the said regulations.
The used/fried oil is simply either disposed into the garbage, sewage and sinks. This is an environmental hazard that blocks sewage and drainage systems.
Hence, FSSAI has launched RUCO, an initiative to collect and convert used-cooking oil into bio-diesel.
Repurpose Used Cooking Oil (RUCO), an ecosystem to
enable the collection and conversion of used cooking oil to bio-diesel.
The scenario hasn’t changed much presently, FSSAI issued an order directing FBOs including restaurants & manufacturers with consumption of more than 50litres of cooking oil per day to mandatorily maintain UCO disposal records and handed over only to the registered collecting agencies.
Why RUCO came into existence?
The purpose of guidelines is to handle and dispose of used oil to safeguard the environment and consumer’s health.
There have been allegations that used cooking oil generated by big-gear restaurants and other FBOs were sold at cheaper rates to roadside eateries and small operators for further use as frying oil and cooking. With the new regulation coming into effect, the oil generated should only be disposed to an agency authorized by FSSAI. This will reduce dependency on imported crude oil, fight pollution, manage the illegal discharge of crude oil into a drainage system that contaminates water.
How to check the TPC of Oil?
A thermometer-like device that measures the polar material or total polar compounds which every food operator should have.
Implementation:
It is difficult to implement this regulation, especially for street vendors due to less consumption and lack of knowledge.
How this can be achieved?
- Tie-up with approved agencies under Biodiesel Engine Association for collection and disposal of used oil.
- Create UCO collection process within the organization
- Create awareness among the production team
- Do not refill the used oil container with the fresh oil, store it separately.
- Cooking oil should be filtered after use.
- Do not dispose of oil in the drains/sewage.
RUCO will help bring about environmentally sustainable development contributing to energy security. This is a revolution against polluting and exploiting an energy source.
An encouragement to biodiesel will help reduce the consumption of fossil fuels and protect our environment.
Reference link:
https://fssai.gov.in/ruco/ruco_booklet.php