FHRAI Magazine - Federation of Hotel and Restaurant Associations ...

[ FHRAI ]Seminars Sub-committee - FHRAIDinesh S.AdvaniChairmanThe whole idea behind a Seminars Sub-committee at FHRAI is to disseminate informationon topics of interest and relevance to hotels and restaurants.At HRAWI we have been conducting seminars for over 10 years. In a year we cover about6-9 seminars in various cities of Western India. Till date we have done seminars in Mumbai,Pune, Baroda, Ahmedabad, Indore, Goa and Loonavala.The topics we have covered are of daily operations such as front office operations,F&B controls, sales & marketing, bartending, housekeeping operations, human resources,social media & internet marketing, security management to name just a few. We have alsoconducted seminars on some out of the box topics like stress management. We bring inspeakers from the fraternity who are more than happy to share their knowledge with the members. Normally in the month ofMarch we have a seminar on the budget and its implications and for the last several years we have Anil Harish speaking on thistopic. Often we have covered topics on burning issues which involve government laws and their implications.Kamlesh Barot, FHRAI President, mooted the idea of having these seminars pan-India. Hence, we are proposing to conduct2-3 seminars in every region over the year. We have shortlisted several topics which we would like to cover this year such as theFSSAI Act, managing hotel and restaurant operations, etc. Members are more than welcome to send their suggestions to theSecretary General of FHRAI.The Seminars Sub-committee will consist of 5 members from the different regions namely, Chetan Mehta, Rajiv Gogia,Rakesh Roy, Gurvinder Singh Juneja and T. Nataraajan. I am banking on the support of my able committee members as wellas the regional associations to take this forward.Our first seminar is in New Delhi on the Food Safety Act which we are conducting along with the HRANI and NRAI, onMarch 16.FSSAI Sub-committee - FHRAIPradeep ShettyChairmanThe Food Safety and Standards Act of India (FSSAI) is a new act that has come into placeto regulate storage, manufacture and sales of food to ensure availability of safe and wholesomefood for public consumption. FSSAI was implemented from August 2011. Under FSSAI, all foodrelated laws have been converged to present a holistic comprehensive law.The law that has been introduced is an ambitious one and FHRAI welcomes the same. Webelieve that the industry representation is needed on the following counts (a) Practical difficultiesinvolved, (b) need for relaxation of penalties and (c) such other rules which may have to bealtered based on the ground realities such as the economic scenario and cultural dynamics of the industry prevalent in India. Wesuspect that problems will start arising when new standards will be implemented and members are likely to be caught unaware.Moreover, presumably the new standards may also lead to rise in cost of operations thereby making our end products costlierfor the customers. Needless to mention that greatest challenge would lie in engaging skilled/trained workforce to adopt this newfood law.FHRAI’s initiative to have a FSSAI Sub-committee is directed towards:• Studying this law in greater details to understand its finer nuances by constituting a core committee where expertise wouldbe drawn from legal, food science, food consultants to key knowledge areas in the food industry. This core committee plans tosubmit a comprehensive document taking into account constructive suggestions, valid objections and suitable recommendationson various aspects of this new law. This report will be presented to the FSSAI Chairperson and expect to do it by March 31,2012. Furthermore, this core-committee would also engage itself with the authority on a regular basis to keep the authoritiesupdated as the new law evolves.• Creating awareness among the members with regard to the various facets of the new law viz., licencing, rules & regulations, etc.framed under this law and standards prescribed etc. The objective being that of ensuring sufficient dissemination of informationto all members so as to enable them to be prepared for the incoming change. We, accordingly, plan to conduct seminars andworkshops pan-India, may be four – one in each region – where core committee will take the issue forward and combine withF&B professionals, chefs & owner/operators who will be our target audience in this context. We also wish that the essence ofthe law with great details to percolate to the lowest level of our industry workforce by enabling ‘Train the Trainer’ module andsynergise a movement wherein our regional set of trainers will be able to train others in the industry, wherever needed.34 FHRAI Magazine february 2012 Visit FHRAI Website: www.fhrai.com