Raw cashew nuts currently fall under India’s “foods not specified” category under the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), which means cashew is regulated through general contaminant and safety rules rather than through a dedicated, cashew-specific product standard of its own. That’s a genuinely under-reported fact given how central India is to global cashew processing and trade, and it has real practical consequences for processors, exporters, and anyone drafting a compliance document that claims cashew “meets FSSAI standards” — a claim that, taken literally, isn’t quite accurate, because there isn’t yet a specific FSSAI cashew standard to meet.
What “foods not specified” actually means
Being classified as a “food not specified” under FSSAI doesn’t mean cashew is unregulated — it means cashew doesn’t have its own dedicated, product-specific standard the way many other foods do, and instead falls back on India’s horizontal, cross-product regulations. The operative framework here is the Food Safety and Standards (Contaminants, Toxins and Residues) Regulations, 2011, which sets general limits on contaminants, toxins, heavy metals, and pesticide residues applicable across food categories broadly, cashew included. In practice, this means aflatoxin and other contaminant compliance for cashew traded within or exported from India is assessed against these general contaminant regulations rather than against a cashew-specific limit table that names cashew explicitly and sets tailored thresholds for it. For testing purposes, this is exactly the kind of nuance worth confirming directly with a qualified lab — India’s CEPCI Laboratory & Research Institute, which is NABL-accredited to ISO/IEC 17025:2017 and FSSAI-notified, is a credible starting point for processors who need current, authoritative guidance on how contaminant testing for cashew is actually structured under this framework.
The contrast with walnuts and spices
What makes cashew’s regulatory position notable is the contrast with other tree nuts and food categories that do have dedicated, finalised FSSAI standards. Walnuts, for example, already have their own specific FSSAI product standard, as do numerous individual spices — categories where FSSAI has gone through the process of drafting, reviewing, and finalising a standard tailored to that specific product’s characteristics and risk profile. Cashew, despite India’s position as one of the world’s largest cashew processing and export economies, has not yet reached that same point. This isn’t necessarily a sign of neglect — regulatory standard-setting is a slow, deliberate process, and general contaminant regulations still provide meaningful legal coverage — but it is a genuine asymmetry worth understanding rather than assuming cashew is regulated identically to nuts that do have a dedicated standard.
The in-progress Codex cashew-kernel standard
This is a developing situation rather than a settled one. India is reportedly advancing work toward a dedicated Codex Alimentarius standard specifically for cashew kernels, tracked through ongoing Codex committee session coverage rather than yet existing as a finalised international document. Because national food-safety authorities, including FSSAI, often align their own domestic standard-setting work with parallel developments at Codex — the international reference body discussed in more depth on the Codex Alimentarius food safety page — progress on a dedicated Codex cashew-kernel standard could plausibly be a precursor to India eventually developing its own dedicated FSSAI cashew standard as well. For now, though, this remains a story to track rather than a change that has already happened, and anyone citing “the FSSAI cashew standard” as an existing, finalised document should be corrected — the more accurate description, as of current available information, is that cashew is governed by general contaminant regulation rather than a dedicated standard.
What this means in practice
For Indian processors and exporters, the practical takeaway is to be precise in compliance documentation: cite the Food Safety and Standards (Contaminants, Toxins and Residues) Regulations, 2011 specifically, rather than an imagined cashew-specific FSSAI number, when documenting regulatory compliance for domestic or export buyers. It also means staying alert to this changing — a Codex cashew-kernel standard, once finalised, would likely influence future FSSAI rulemaking, and processors who are already tracking Codex developments will be better positioned to adapt quickly rather than being caught unprepared by a new domestic standard once it lands. Exporters selling into markets with more codified numeric limits — such as the EU’s aflatoxin figures under Regulation (EU) 2023/915, covered on the EU import compliance page, or the FSVP-driven US requirements covered on the US FDA import requirements page — should be careful not to assume FSSAI compliance automatically satisfies those separate, distinct regulatory regimes; each market’s rules stand on their own.
This page reflects regulatory status as researched and should be reconfirmed directly with FSSAI, CEPCI, or a qualified compliance professional before being treated as final for a specific business or export decision — this is a genuinely developing area of regulation.