EU limits are a third of India's. What that means for your order.

Buyers new to Indian spices are often handed a certificate of analysis marked "FSSAI compliant" and assume that settles it. It does not. India and the European Union set different limits for the same contaminants, and the EU tests for one that India does not regulate at all.

This is the single most common reason a first consignment goes wrong, so it is worth being precise about the numbers.

Aflatoxin: the EU limit is one third of India's

For spices, India's FSSAI limits are aflatoxin B1 at 15 µg/kg and total aflatoxin at 30 µg/kg. The EU limits are **5 µg/kg for B1 and 10 µg/kg total**.

A lot can therefore be perfectly legal in India and non-compliant in Hamburg on exactly the same certificate. If you are buying for the EU or the UK, the specification you agree has to say the EU figure, and the lab report has to show it.

Ochratoxin A: regulated in the EU, not by FSSAI

The EU also caps ochratoxin A in spices, at 20 µg/kg. Indian food law does not set a limit for it in spices, so a standard domestic test panel will not include it unless you ask.

Any lot going to Europe should be tested for it, and the report should be in your hands before the container is booked, not after it lands.

Ethylene oxide is the reason most consignments are rejected

Ethylene oxide is a sterilant. Its use on food is banned in the EU, where the limit is effectively the detection floor — 0.1 mg/kg applies to spice mixtures and seasonings. It is the most frequent cause of Indian spice consignments being rejected at the EU border, and the residue can come from a fumigation step several links up the chain rather than from the exporter.

The only reliable answer is to test every lot and to know the supply chain well enough to know where fumigation could have happened.

Border checks you should plan around

The EU applies increased official controls to certain Indian goods at a set percentage of consignments. At the time of writing that includes:

• Cumin — 50% of consignments checked for pesticide residues, and separately 20% for ethylene oxide
• Cardamom — 30% checked for ethylene oxide
• Pepper, turmeric and coriander — 20% checked

A checked consignment is held until the result comes back. That is not a rejection, but it is a delay, and it needs to be in your lead-time planning rather than treated as an exception.

What we do about it

Testing before shipment has been mandatory under the Spices Board's scheme since 27 March 2023, and the required tests differ by destination. We work to the stricter of the two rulebooks rather than the local one, which in practice means the EU limits for anything Europe-bound, and we ship the analytical report with the documents rather than on request.

If you are buying for a market we have not shipped to before, tell us which one at the enquiry stage. The specification, the testing panel and the certificate all change with the destination, and it is far cheaper to get that right before production than to discover it at a border post.