ahmedabad soon when you go into a store and see a pack of chips or biscuits the stars would shine light on the fact if you are making a healthy or an unhealthy choice the proposed 5star rating system for packaged food items would indicate that the chips have two stars for example due to high sodium content or biscuits have three stars for high sugar and moderate fibre content akin to star ratings on electronic appliances such as airconditioners and refrigerators indicating energy efficiency the stars on food packs would indicate just how nutritionally prudent choice you made with your buythe star rating system has been recommended following an exhaustive research covering more than 20000 respondents across india by a team of iim ahmedabad iima professors arvind sahay and ranjan kumar ghosh along with doctoral student rahul sanghvi at dexter consultancy once implemented india would soon join several other countries in introducing frontofpack labelling fopl on the food items to inform the consumers about nutritional values in the pack the research report consumer preferences for different nutrition frontofpack labels in india has been recently uploaded on the food safety and standards authority of india fssai website sources close to the development said that after consultation with all stakeholders on recommendations the system is likely to be introduced soonghosh said that its mandatory to show the contents of the pack but whenever a consumer decides to make a purchase of a pack of chips or biscuits or packed snacks we dont generally check the fine print on nutritional value or content of fat sugar or salt he said even if a few do there are no indicators whether the values are within the acceptable rangethe report mentioned that noncommunicable diseases ncds contribute to 587 lakh deaths in india annually which is about 60 of all deaths the report said easy availability of energydense foods high in saturated fat sugar and salt is one of the leading factors contributing to the rise in obesity and ncdsacross the globe some methods of fopl include health star rating hsr nutriscore warning label multiple traffic lights mtl and monochrome guideline daily amount gda for the team at iima the challenge was to recommend a system that can be comprehensible acceptable and yet effective keeping in mind the regional and linguistic diversity of indiawe thus devised an elaborate randomized sampling trial across india 20564 respondents across 20 states in india possibly the largest such randomized control trial rct study in the world to understand suitability of fopls covering all the states all educational profiles all age groups and a broad spectrum of occupations professions all strata of monthly income male and female and urban and rural populations to ascertain how fopl can be made effective said prof sahay adding that the study covered all five popular methods of fopl and also no fopl systemthe consumers were asked whether they could easily identify the contents on the pack understanding its health implications and presence of excess