Micro and Small Enterprises using less than 10 cubic meters of water per day shall be exempted from the requirement of NOC of the groundwater authority. In this regard, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India has issued an addendum to the Guidelines on requirement of 'No Objection Certificate (NOC)' from the Central Ground Water Authority (CGWA) for grant, renewal and product modification of FSSAI License.

The addendum says that the Micro and Small Enterprises drawing ground water less than ‘10 cum/day’ are exempted from seeking ‘No Objection Certificate’ for ground water extraction.

“Accordingly, the FBOs which fall under Micro and Small Enterprise category and the groundwater withdrawal for the project is less than 10 cum/day (-10 KLD) are exempted from obtaining NOC from the CGWA or the respective State Ground Water Authority for grant/renewal product modification of FSSAI License,” reads the FSSAI notice.

However, such FBOs shall be required to upload the Self-Declaration in the prescribed format while applying for grant, renewal or modification of FSSAI State as well as Central License.

And all the FBOs eligible for the exemption can avail it across the country.

The notice further reads, “The said exemptions shall be available to all the eligible FBOs across the Country including for the States UTS that have come out with their own groundwater abstraction guidelines /legislations and have their respective State Ground Water Authorities.”

FSSAI says the addendum is applicable with immediate effect and has asked the food safety commissioners and licensing authorities that all the pending applications for obtaining new renewal modification of FSSAI licenses may be examined and processed by the concerned Licensing Authorities accordingly.