Mumbai, July 10 -- The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in Maharashtra is set to undergo a major upgrade, with a significant expansion of its laboratory infrastructure and food sample testing capacity, said FDA Commissioner Rajesh Narwekar. The 325 newly recruited food safety officers and the two new upcoming laboratories, will address the earlier shortage of staff, increase the collection of food samples across the state, and allow more samples to be tested. Narwekar said, "Each food safety officer will be tasked with collecting at least 10 samples. This means around 3,250 samples will be gathered-almost three times more than before." In addition to the three functional FDA laboratories in Mumbai, Sambhajinagar, and Nagpur, Narvekar said that two more will be added soon in Pune and Nashik. "The construction of the Pune laboratory has been completed, while the Nashik facility is expected to be ready in the next two months," he added. At present, Mumbai and the Konkan region carry the bulk of the testing responsibility. However, Narvekar emphasized the need to distribute the testing load more evenly across regions. "Nearly 80% of pharmaceutical manufacturing takes place in areas like Palghar, Ambernath, and Taloja. The food industry also has a heavy presence here....