Independent research carried out by the University of Leeds has estimated that two million fewer in-scope HFSS products were sold per day following the introduction of new legislation to restrict supermarket sales of foods high in fat, sugar or salt (HFSS).

For the evaluation, researchers used store level sales and product data from Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s and Tesco, alongside the Priority Places for Food Index. This is an online tool which identifies neighbourhoods most in need of support to access affordable, healthy and sustainable foods.

They also conducted surveys and interviews with representatives from the four UK supermarkets, the British Retail Consortium (BRC) and enforcement officers.

Nearly 2,000 shoppers were also surveyed to find out how the legislation was perceived and how it impacted shopping behaviours.

Before the legislation was implemented, 20 out of every 100 items sold were in-scope HFSS products. Following legislation this number dropped to 19.

Read more about the research here

The UK’s Fisheries Administrations have launched the ‘Fish, Trace, Ship’ campaign to support the UK’s seafood supply chain prepare for major changes in how we export to EU businesses from 10 January 2026.

The campaign, led by the Marine Management Organisation (MMO), will make clear what action will need to be taken by each sector of the supply chain, from fishers and merchants through to processors and exporters, to be ready for these imminent changes.

MMO has set up a dedicated campaign site to provide an easy-to-access information resource as well as a source of latest news and educational guides.

The online content will be continually updated over the coming weeks and months so businesses are urged to sign up for updates to ensure they are always up to speed with developments.

New EU Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated fishing (IUU) requirements mean that UK exporters will need to provide additional information on Catch Certificates from 10 January 2026. To support exporters in preparing for these changes, the new fields will be rolled out in the Catch Certificate application in three planned releases, from July 2025.

During this initial period, the new fields will be optional to complete. This phased approach is designed to give exporters time to become familiar with the information they will need to provide once the requirements become mandatory in January 2026.

The new requirements cover following areas:

• Fishing Trip Dates
• Gear Type
• Catch Areas
• Transport details
• Appearance
• Data Upload Journey
• Csv file structure

More detail can be found here

On 2^nd September the Cabinet Office published the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) implementation report 2023-2024.

This report covers the period from April 2023 to December 2024, and updates on the progress made since the publication of the first TCA implementation report in June 2023, which detailed the first two years of the TCA’s operation. As such, it spans a period intersected by a general election where there was a change in government.

It seeks to summarise the UK’s engagement with the EU under the TCA, highlighting key areas of progress in implementation and where the UK government continued to engage meaningfully with the EU through the TCA’s institutional frameworks, including the Partnership Council and specialised committees, ensuring that both parties navigate the challenges and opportunities that arise from our relationship with the EU.

While the reporting period runs from January 2023 to December 2024, this report also includes developments in the first quarter of 2025, ending with the first UK-EU Summit on 19 May 2025.

The government intends to publish future implementation reports every 2 years.

The report can be accessed here

The Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) have recently published a decision tree and calculator for determining food product reformulation baseline.

Over four years (2021-2025), the Department of Health aims to reduce calories, saturated fat, sugar and salt in the Irish diet.

The food industry (including food manufacturers and foodservice providers) are being asked to use less of these target nutrients in many everyday foods. The voluntary goals finalised in December 2021 are intended to help people improve their diet and their overall health.

This decision tree and calculator for determining food product reformulation baseline will support food businesses in achieving these targets for calories, saturated fat, sugar and salt.

The document is an Excel spreadsheet. Press and can be downloaded here

The Department of Health, the Food Standards Agency (FSA), and Safefood have published the National Diet and Nutrition Survey Report for Northern Ireland (2017-2023).

The National Diet and Nutrition Survey (NDNS) is a continuous cross-sectional survey, designed to assess the diet, nutrient intake and nutritional status of the general population aged 18 months and over living in private households in the UK.

To provide a representative sample of the Northern Ireland population, each fieldwork year, Department of Health, FSA and Safefood, fund the additional recruitment of around 100 adults, aged 19 years and older and 100 children, aged 18 months to 18 years living in Northern Ireland to be surveyed.

Key Findings

Fruit and Vegetables

• Fruit and vegetable intake was below the ‘5 A Day’* recommendation in all age and sex groups.
• Only 4% of 11- to 18-year-olds meet the ‘5 A Day’ recommendation for fruit and vegetable intake.
• As income increased, the percentage of those meeting the ‘5-A-Day’ recommendation for fruit and vegetable intake also increased.

Fibre

• Fibre intake was below government recommendations for all age groups.
• In men aged 65 years and over, fibre intake increased with increasing income.

Sugar

• 11- to 18-year-olds were the highest mean consumers of sugary, fizzy drinks and squashes at 167mls/day.
• Mean consumption of confectionary was highest in 11- to 18-year-olds, at 14g/day for boys, and 20g/day for girls.

Red Meat

• 11- to 18-year-old boys were the highest mean consumers of meat products (67g/day).
• Women aged 65 years and over were the lowest mean consumers (17g/day).
• Apart from 4- to 10-year-olds mean daily consumption was higher for males than females.

Chips and Fried Foods

• The highest mean consumption of chips and other fried foods was among 11- to 18-year-olds (37g/day for boys and 50g/day for girls).
• Consumption was lowest for 65-year-olds and over (16g/day for men and 8g/day for women).

Saturated Fat and Free Sugars

• In all age groups, recommendations for intake of mean saturated fatty acids and free sugars were exceeded.

Total Energy 

• Mean daily intakes of total energy in 18 months to 3-year-olds exceeded the Estimated Average Requirement (EAR) and were close to the EAR for 4- to 10-year-olds.

Out of Home Food Consumption

• 88% of 11- to 18-year-olds reported buying food or drink from the out of home sector (for example cafes, pubs, takeaways) in the last 7 days followed by 84% of 19- to 64-year-olds and 80% of 4- to 10-year-olds.

You can read the report in full here

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) recently reported that four men had been given custodial sentences for diverting meat not fit for human consumption back into the human food chain

The defendants were convicted earlier this year following an investigation by Southwark Council and the Food Standard Agency’s National Food Crime Unit, with a judge at the Inner London Crown Court handing down custodial sentences.

Anthony Fear, sole director of a business known as Fears Animal Products Ltd was sentenced to 42 months in prison for conspiracy to defraud by placing food not fit for human consumption on the market and disqualified from acting as a company director for six years.

Mark Hooper, a manager at Fears Animal Products Ltd, was sentenced to 24 months in prison, suspended for two years, for conspiracy to defraud by placing food not fit for human consumption on the market and was ordered to complete 200 hours of unpaid work.

Azar Irshad was sentenced to 35 months in prison for conspiracy to defraud, failure to comply with Regulation 19 of the Food Safety & Hygiene Regulations relating to unapproved premises, placing food not fit for human consumption on the market (smokies), placing food not fit for human consumption on the market (out of date beef burgers) and placing food not fit for human consumption on the market (Illegally diverted ABP Cat 3).  Irshad was also given a criminal behaviour order for an indefinite period, prohibiting any involvement in the food industry.

Ali Afzal was sentenced to six months in prison, suspended for 21 months, 150 hours unpaid work, and ordered to pay costs of £5000, for failure to comply with Regulation 19 Food Safety & Hygiene Regulations relating to unapproved premises.

Fears Animal Products Ltd will be sentenced in 2026 following the conclusion of confiscation proceedings. Costs for Fear, Hooper, and Irshad will also be determined following the conclusion of confiscation proceedings.

Mark Hooper also pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges relating to a separate matter in Aylesbury and received a concurrent 24-month sentence.

The sentencing follows court proceedings on a complex investigation that began when Southwark officers discovered 1.9 tonnes of Category 3 animal by- products, including whole and cut chickens, lamb’s testicles and beef burgers, being processed for sale into the human food chain at an illegal meat cutting plant in London. The illegal cutting plant was not registered as a food business, had no running hot water and the meat was prepared in unhygienic conditions.

NFCU enquiries traced the animal by products back to legitimate food business operators who confirmed these meat products had been sent to Fears Animal Byproducts in Somerset for manufacture into pet foods or for safe disposal.

Once meat is classified as an animal by- product, it is permanently excluded from the human food chain for safety reasons. Evidence of criminal conspiracy was then pieced together through analysis of large volumes of communications data and other evidence which revealed the criminal relationship between the four men.

The European Commission have now published their most recent report on agri-food fraud suspicions, which covers the month of July.

The Official Control Regulation requires Member States organising risk-based controls to identify and combat fraudulent and deceptive practices along the agri-food chain.

These monthly reports include ‘non-compliances with fraud suspicions’ of cross-border nature identified and shared between members of the Alert and Cooperation Network (ACN) and retrieved from its three components: the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed network (RASFF), the Administrative Assistance and Cooperation network (AAC) and the Agri-Food Fraud Network (FFN).

Non-compliances with fraud suspicions affecting one single Member State are not shared in the ACN and therefore not reported within these monthly reports.

The monthly reports cover food, feedingstuff, materials and articles intended to come into contact directly or indirectly with food, animal welfare issues for farmed animals, plant protection products, veterinary medicinal products and other inputs that may end in the form of residues and contaminants in food and feed.

The monthly reports do not reconcile data and suspicions related to the following subjects:

• animal and plant health,
• release into the environment of Genetically Modified Organisms,
• animal welfare for companion animals,
• placing on the market and use of plant protection products, veterinary medicinal products and other inputs that are not ending as residues and contaminants in food and feed, and
• animal by-products and derived products when they not intended to be used for oral feeding to animals.

This latest report highlights 136 suspicions, which includes 27 records of suspected record tampering, 53 records of suspected product tampering, and 56 other non-compliances.

You can access the report here

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) have published the papers which were presented at their September Board meeting held in Belfast.

The agenda for this meeting included:

• Annual Local Authority Performance
• Annual FSA Science Update
• Animal Welfare Report 2024/25
• Annual Freedom of Information Requests, External Complaints and Internal Whistleblowing Report
• Report from the Director for FSA in Wales
• Annual Report from the Chair of the Audit and Risk Assurance Committee (ARAC)

In due course a recording of the meeting will also be published.

To read the papers in more detail please click here