PM Narendra Modi’s 75th Independence Day speech promised to bring six big announcements out of which nutrition was one. In his speech, he mentioned that staple food rice should be fortified to make it nutritious. Fortified rice for the poor will be distributed from the year 2024 in mid-day meals, ration shops, and other distribution schemes.

India’s malnutrition numbers are still the most frightening in the world. According to the Global Hunger Index – calculated based on total undernourishment of the population, child stunting, wasting and child mortality – India stands at 94th position among 107 countries. Besides that, malnourishment in India causes losses worth $12 billion in GDP annually. Due to lockdown, several crucial government schemes were disrupted that could benefit millions of women and children.

Though the government is launching multiple schemes to eradicate malnourishment from the country, a change in the nutrition amount of nutraceuticals and food products can play a pivotal role in bridging the nutrition deficiency. 

Recently, FSSAI ( Food Safety and Standards Authority of India) has published new rules on the Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) of vitamins and minerals which will come into force from July 1, 2023. Here is what the food businesses and nutraceutical companies should know. 

New Rules on Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) by FSSAI 

• The RDA for vitamin C in men has been increased from 40 mg to 80 mg and for women, the same has been increased from 40 mg to 65 mg. 
• The amount of Zinc content in men has been increased from 12 mg to 17 mg whereas in women it has been kept 13.2 mg from 10 mg. 
• The RDA of sodium for men has been reduced from 2100 mg to 2000 mg and for women, the value has been increased to 2000 mg from 1900 mg. 
• The Calcium content for both men and women has been increased from 600mg to 1000mg. 
• The new Vitamin A amount for both men and women is now 1000ug and 840ug respectively.

A newly wedded millennial couple was perplexed looking at the redundant gifts received that included five pressure cookers, four crockery sets, four mixer grinders, and so many wall clocks. The couple who was to shift abroad, found the gifts irrelevant as the cookers were not induction cooktop friendly and the fragile crockery sets cannot be carried. These repeated wedding gifts will face the same fate as the Soanpapdi box received during Diwali, ready to repack and gift and the saga continues.

Unlike other generations the millennials are believers in living a sustainable life and are drawn towards philanthropist activities such as donating to charitable organisations, contributing to community welfare, etc. The same behaviour is exhibited in millennial weddings as well, where the newly married couples have donated the gift money received from guests to charity.

The millennial couples of today would like to receive gifts that will have high memory value and can cherish such experiences for a lifetime.

This changing millennial mindset soon became an opportunity for Kanika Subbaih, who founded India’s first gift registry platform- Wedding Wishlist. Weddings in India are a big affair, where people spend a third of their savings in creating king-size celebrations, out of which 15 percent is spent on gifts alone. The gift registry platforms with their origin in western countries, helps families avoid waste also helping the couple start their new life with all the essential things they require.

 The Wedding Wishlist – What is it?

Wedding Wishlist is an online gift registry platform that offers free service to couples. The wedding website allows the couple to create a portal for free, where they can fill in the function details, their story, gift preferences and RSVPs. The couple creates a Wishlist of items that they require. If a couple is planning to shift to a new city or shifting abroad their gift requirement will comprise of home décor items, appliances. The couple chooses brands from which it wants to be gifted. The platform has brands of luggage backpacks, grooming products, jewellery, crockery, beauty and spa, adventure getaways, holiday packages, etc. Wedding Wishlist earns commission from the brands from which the guests make purchases.

If a couple wishes to donate to charitable organisations such as orphanages, handicapped individuals, old-age homes, or pet dogs they can enter the amount they wish to donate to the charitable organisation.

The serene beauty of the hills in Manali and Dharamshala are marred with the sight of a humongous pile of single-use plastic bottles. If the average water consumption of humans is approximately 3.7 litres meaning 4 bottles, imagine the amount of single-use plastic generated while travelling as we will sweat more. During the peak tourist season in Manali, the hikers and tourists leave behind a trail of plastic that amounts to approximately 30-40 tonnes of plastic waste each day. 

The numbers about plastic management in India are frightening as the study conducted by Un-Plastic Collective (UPC) reveals that India generates about 9.46 million tonnes of plastic waste annually, out of which 40 percent remains uncollected and 43 percent is used for packaging, most of which is single-use. Most single-use plastic is recyclable but lacks recycling infrastructure where they end up in water bodies or landfills. On a global level itself, only 9 percent of the plastic is recycled.

Two Hyderabad techies, realising the poor plastic recycling infrastructure and the ever-growing plastic waste menace, have decided to fight it by launching a biodegradable water packaging solution – Caro Water. 

What is Caro Water?

 Caro Water, started in June 2021, is the brainchild of two techies -Suneeth Tatineni and Chaitanya Ayinapudi, who after working in the corporate for five years decided to start their entrepreneurial journey in the sustainability and environment space, by coming up with environment-friendly water packaging solutions.

The Fintech Industry has discovered a very fresh and promising consumer base of children and teenagers in India. This is a very new-age approach by the fintech industry and one that’s producing much-needed, progressive results for the young generation of India. The age demographic for this novel consumer base is under 18 years of age. 

Vital Financial and Life Skills to be inculcated through Kids Fintech products

• Growing wealth

• Money Management

• Pocket money tracking

• Expenditure tracking

• Savings and Compound Interest Rates

• Financial literacy and independence

Market opportunity

The current market opportunity for children and teenagers is huge in fintech. Young adults and kids in India make up for 41% of the total Indian population. The market has newly been discovered and new entrants are only just cropping up. 

Fintech’s approach towards Kids’ Money Management

Fintech start-ups are approaching Kids Money Management through Gamification and AI (artificial intelligence) driven insights. They are using creative ways to garner children’s interest towards expense and savings tracking. 

By also involving parents into the solution, fintech products are firmly placing the safety net around kids’ money management.

What the Fintech industry stands to gain from Kids’ business

The Fintech industry is showing keen interest towards the kids’ business since they have identified several long-term benefits to the industry:

• • Increase in the user pool

By roping in children who constitute a major chunk of the Indian population, the fintech industry will gain a spike in its consumer base. 

• • Easier to enforce regulations and compliance

By onboarding the young demographic early on into financial services, it will be fairly easy for the fintech industry to enforce regulations and compliance. 

• • Strengthening online security

By raising awareness among kids and teens who are most vulnerable to cyber-attacks, online security and protection against payment data breach and scams can be strengthened. 

Today, wearable items are being promoted and adopted by companies more than ever. And there’s a reason for that. Wearable devices are electronic devices that can be worn on the body and have specific practical applications. Modern wearables can, in fact, replace your smartphone in various instances. The devices are expected to have a major impact on health, fitness, and recreation in the future, and that’s the reason for the big push in the segment.

As per the latest data, smartwatches and fitness bands in electronic wearables recorded the biggest quarter in India in 2020. Retailers sold 15.2 million units, an increase of 198.2% over the previous year. In addition, the country exported 1 million units in the first quarter and 1.3 million units in the subsequent quarter.

Chinese Electronics Giant Xiaomi Leads the Indian Wearables Market

Subsequent new launches are driving the growth for brands like Noise, Realme, Apple, and Amazfit. Chinese electronics company Xiaomi is the largest company in the wearables sector in India with a market share of 48.1% and an annual growth of 54.7%. TATA-owned Titan has mounted a surprise push to emerge in the second spot with a market portion of 14. 5 per cent as its shipments grew 24.1 per cent during 2020.

Volnaa, a beverage company has come up with a unique and surprising product to tackle the mounting problem of plastic pollution due to packaged drinking water. The product is named Volnaa and is a very sleek, interesting answer to on-the-go purchase of plastic water bottles. Volnaa water is ‘Bottled’ in aluminium cans which are 100% recyclable with ‘relock revolution’ – technology that allows for relocking the lids. 

Volnaa Beverages Private Limited is an F&B start-up co-founded in 2020 by Kartik Rajput and Kushagra Sharma. The company is mainly involved in the collection, purification, and distribution of water. However, the idea behind their product is much bigger than this process. Volnaa sources natural mineral water from the Himalayas with a pH level of 7.9.

Reducing plastic pollution: an industry trend

The founders of Volnaa have redefined the generic packaged water bottle. A single use plastic bottle which is responsible for a major portion of the global plastic pollution. By redesigning the packaging of water in an eco-friendly manner, Volnaa has spurred a new market for aluminium can water with relock lid technology. Last year a similar beverage brand ‘Responsible whatr’ had unveiled their ‘water in a can’ product. This goes to show that the trend is catching on in India with new players showing themselves in the new market. 

Increase in sales even with 6x price

The fact that the average price of the aluminium can packaged water costs 6 times higher than regular bottled water doesn’t seem to deter consumers. 

Nevertheless, if the solution is for a good cause, the price paid is worth it. And the problem to be solved is one that’s extremely important if we want to save the Earth from the dangerous plastic pollution which has already reached its peak. Global warming which is showing itself with unpredictable climate change across the globe needs to be tackled now. Putting an end to the production of single-use plastic bottles is a big leap towards ridding the earth of plastic waste.