New allergen labelling rules for food businesses – Natasha Law

From 1 October 2021 foods which are prepacked for direct sale to the consumer must be labelled with any allergenic ingredients.

Prepacked direct sale (known as PPDS) products are foods which a business, such as a fish and chip shop may package on site for sale later. 

New food safety legislation in the UK requires full ingredients listed and any of the 14 allergens emphasised in the ingredients list. 

The 14 allergens are 

• Celery 
• cereals containing gluten (such as barley and oats),  
• crustaceans (such as prawns, crabs and lobsters),  
• eggs,
• fish,  
• lupin,
• milk,  
• molluscs (such as mussels and oysters),  
• mustard,  
• peanuts,  
• sesame,  
• soybeans,  
• sulphur dioxide and sulphites (if they are at a concentration of more than ten parts per million) 
• tree nuts (such as almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, brazil nuts, cashews, pecans, pistachios and macadamia nuts).  

Food is considered to be prepacked if it is enclosed in packaging so that its content cannot be altered or modified unless the packaging is opened or damaged. Fish and chips shops may now need to consider ingredient labels for goods such as tartar sauce, mushy peas, rolls and vacuum packed fillets.  

Seafish has provided full guidance which is available on their Allergen Labelling Laws web page. It is also available as a PDF to make it easy to print out for staff.