Every food and drink manufacturer carries the same core duties, whatever the product. Before you produce or sell anything you must register your food business, run a food safety management system, label your products correctly, keep your workers safe, hold employers' liability insurance, and meet your site's environmental and packaging duties. This guide is the universal spine for makers of food and drink (SIC division 10_11): work through it first, then pick up the product-specific guides that apply to what you make.
Several of these duties are devolved, so the rules and the body that enforces them differ across the four nations. Each section below names the regulator for your nation. Start the duties that need lead time early — registration, your food safety system and any environmental permit all take time to put in place.
Register your food business
Registration is your first step and it is free. You must register every premises you use, at least 28 days before you start trading. This duty is devolved: in England you register with your local authority, with the Food Standards Agency providing oversight; in Scotland you register with your local authority under Food Standards Scotland; and Wales and Northern Ireland run their own registration rules under the Food Standards Agency. You cannot opt out — registration is what brings your site into the inspection system below.
Put a food safety management system in place
The law requires you to base food safety on the principles of HACCP — hazard analysis and critical control points. You identify where food safety hazards can arise, decide the points where you must control them, set limits, monitor them and act when something goes wrong. Your system must be written down and kept up to date as your processes change. This duty applies in all four nations under retained EU food hygiene law, with the Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland providing guidance.
Expect a hygiene rating inspection
Once registered, an environmental health officer from your local authority will inspect your premises and give you a hygiene rating based on what they find. The rating scheme is devolved: England, Wales and Northern Ireland use the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme (FHRS), while Scotland uses the Food Hygiene Information Scheme (FHIS) run under Food Standards Scotland. Display rules also differ by nation — it is mandatory to display your rating in Wales and Northern Ireland. Keep your HACCP records ready, because the officer will check them.
Label your products correctly
If you pre-pack food or drink, the label must carry the legally required information, and allergen information is the part that most often goes wrong. You must declare any of the 14 regulated allergens whenever they are used as an ingredient, and emphasise them in the ingredients list. Food prepacked for direct sale must also carry a full ingredients list with allergens emphasised. These rules apply across the four nations under retained food information law, with the Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland enforcing through local authorities. Allergen errors can make people seriously ill, so treat labelling as a food safety control, not a packaging afterthought.
Protect your workers
As an employer you must protect the health and safety of your workers and anyone affected by your work. Food manufacturing sites carry real risks from machinery, slips, manual handling, noise and hazardous substances, and you must assess and control them. This duty applies in Great Britain, where the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) enforces it, and in Northern Ireland, where the Health and Safety Executive for Northern Ireland (HSENI) enforces the equivalent law.
Control flour and grain dust
Flour and grain dust is the single biggest cause of occupational asthma in food manufacturing, affecting bakeries, mills and any site that handles bulk flour or grain. Breathing it in can cause bakers' asthma and millers' asthma, which can end a worker's career. You must assess exposure and control it under the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 — by reducing dust at source, using extraction, and providing health surveillance for exposed workers. HSE in Great Britain and HSENI in Northern Ireland treat respiratory disease as an enforcement priority in this sector.
If you employ anyone, you must by law hold employers' liability insurance to cover claims from workers who are injured or made ill by their work. This is a legal requirement across Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and you can be fined for every day you trade without it.
Meet your site's environmental and packaging duties
A food or drink factory uses water, produces waste and discharges effluent, and each of those can trigger a duty. Larger sites — including big sugar, starch and similar installations that fall under industrial-emissions controls — need an environmental permit before they operate, applying the best available techniques and controlling emissions. Apply to the environmental regulator for your nation: the Environment Agency in England, Natural Resources Wales in Wales, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) in Scotland, and the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) in Northern Ireland.
If you discharge anything other than clean surface water or domestic sewage to the public sewer — washdown water, process effluent or strong organic waste — you need trade effluent consent from your water and sewerage company before you start. In England and Wales you apply to your sewerage undertaker, in Scotland to Scottish Water, and in Northern Ireland to NI Water.
If you place packaged products on the UK market, the extended producer responsibility (EPR) rules for packaging may apply to you. You may have to record the packaging you handle, report the data, and meet recycling obligations and fees. Check whether you meet the turnover and tonnage thresholds that bring you into scope.
Steps to get set up
Work through these in order. Registration and your food safety system come first because nothing else can start without them, and the environmental permit and effluent consent need the most lead time.
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1. Register your food business
Register every premises with your local authority — at least 28 days before you trade — with the Food Standards Agency or Food Standards Scotland providing oversight for your nation.
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2. Put your food safety management system in place
Build a written HACCP-based system: identify hazards, set your critical control points, monitor them, and keep the records ready for the hygiene rating inspection.
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3. Get your labelling right
Make sure every pre-packed product carries the legally required information and declares and emphasises the 14 regulated allergens. Treat allergen accuracy as a food safety control.
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4. Protect your workers and insure them
Assess and control workplace risks, including flour and grain dust under COSHH, and hold employers' liability insurance before anyone starts work.
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5. Meet your environmental and packaging duties
Check whether your site needs an environmental permit and trade effluent consent, apply to the right regulator for your nation, and check whether the packaging EPR rules apply to you.
What to do next
This spine covers the duties every food and drink manufacturer shares. On top of it, pick up the product-specific guides that apply to what you make: approval for products of animal origin, alcohol production and duty, soft drinks and bottled water, animal feed and pet food, and the composition and contaminant rules for your product. When you have worked through the relevant guides, run the food and drink manufacturing compliance checklist before you start production to confirm nothing is missing. If you are unsure whether a permit or consent applies to your site, confirm it with the relevant regulator before you commit.
Official sources
Statutory sources and regulators for registering and running a food and drink manufacturing business