New UK Food Standards Delivery Model and the Impact on Festival Food Vendors.

With little publicity new standards for the food industry will come into law in March 2025. The new UK Food Standards Delivery Model will become part of the regulatory framework enforced by local authorities and is designed to work under existing food law. What impact will this have on the thousands of mobile food vendors attending music festivals every year.

This new model will fall under the UK’s Food Law Code of Practice and related legislation and will dictate how food standards are enforced, combining inspections, risk assessments, and interventions based on food businesses' compliance. Whilst this may be workable for food establishment with a fixed address operating within a given local authority compliance may become more complex when considering mobile food vendors that regularly move locations. 

The FSA and Food Safety in the UK. 
The Food Standards Agency (FSA) is an independent government department responsible for protecting public health concerning food safety and ensuring that food businesses comply with laws related to food standards and hygiene. The FSA ensures that all food businesses follow strict safety protocols to prevent foodborne illnesses and other hazards. In addition, the FSA enforce allergen labelling and food standards delivery along with research on food safety and sustainability. 

Enforcement. 
In the UK it is the responsibility of local authorities to implement the food standards delivery model which does include all mobile food vendors. They will check hygiene standards, allergen management and food labeling. Local authorities will conduct inspections based on data gathered from food sampling, previous inspections and public complaints. Most local authorities are already transitioning to the new model in preparation for March 2025. Enforcement will be conducted under existing food safety laws (Food Safety Act 1990) where non-compliance can result in penalties, fines and even closure of a business. 

What are the New Requirements. 
The key requirements under the new model will focus on food safety especially regarding allergen management, food labeling and imported foods. This relates to risks identified by undeclared allergens which has been highlighted as a major issue and relates to Natasha's Law. This mandates that all pre-packed foods provide full ingredient labeling, including allergen information, to protect consumers. The new model will focus on high-risk establishments and any that deal with imported foods. 

Impact on Mobile Vendors. 
The FSA already considers mobile food vendors as a higher risk because of the changing locations and environments. Local authorities are likely to implement stricter inspections and controls on mobile vendors than those with a fixed address. The likely outcome is that mobile vendors will be subject to more frequent inspections which will be combined with food hygiene standards checks too. This means that mobile vendors will need to have a higher level of preparedness for such inspections and will have to ensure strong compliance with food hygiene, allergen management, and record-keeping to avoid increased inspection frequencies. 

Music festival organisers should appraise themselves of these new requirements and build in more robust monitoring of food vendors that apply for pitch spaces at their events. Food vendors are already required to submit evidence of their food hygiene certification, but organisers can also ask about their compliance with the New UK Food Standards Delivery Model. 

For festival organisers planning their events using a software management platform like Festival Pro gives them all the functionality they need manage every aspect of their event logistics including a comprehensive vendor management module. The guys who are responsible for this software have been in the front line of event management for many years and the features are built from that experience and are performance artists themselves. The Festival Pro platform is easy to use and has comprehensive features with specific modules for managing artists, contractors, venues/stages, vendors, volunteers, sponsors, guestlists, ticketing, cashless payments and contactless ordering.  

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