Dear All,
Detailed below is the Weekly News for the 15th February.
On Covid, the government continues to encourage work place testing for all workers who cannot work from home.
On Brexit attention turns to the UK Border Readiness for processing imports to the UK from 1st April.
Have a good week.
Gordon Polson
Chief Executive
Federation of Bakers Ltd
Defra have shared a social media post on the current gene editing consultation (with a video from our Chief Scientific Adviser).
The UK Government is consulting on proposed changes to legislation governing food in England, following the UK’s departure from the EU. The focus of the consultation is on rules governing products including meat, fruit curds, mincemeat, spreadable fats and flour. The proposed changes reflect the UK’s new trading relationship with the EU and ensure that we remain compliant with World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules, while supporting domestic food businesses. In particular, the proposals would remove the mutual recognition clauses from regulations governing these products and require imports from the EU/EEA and Turkey to meet England’s standards in future, as other WTO countries are already required to do. The Government recognises that removal of the mutual recognition clause in The Bread and Flour Regulations 1998 would cause manufacturers in England to lose all access to unfortified flour, so it is considering further extending the existing defence of selling non-compliant flour destined for export to additionally include a new defence for sale of non-compliant flour to be used to manufacture products that are destined for export. The other UK nations will consider and deal with amendments to their own respective regulations. This consultation does not propose other changes to the Bread and Flour Regulations (for example on folic acid flour fortification), which has been the subject of discussion with industry and the Devolved Administrations. The Government considers “that those other changes need more in-depth consideration, which we plan to pursue later in 2021.” The deadline for responding to this consultation is 22 March 2021.
Businesses that took out government-backed Bounce Back Loans to get through Covid-19 will now have greater flexibility to repay their loans, the government announced.
Hauliers are currently exempt from the general requirement to have proof of a negative COVID-19 test before arriving in England. More information, and confirmation that hauliers are exempt can be found here. Hauliers will still need to complete a passenger locator form before travelling to the UK
The National Workplace Testing programme will identify more positive cases of COVID-19 and ensure those infected isolate, protecting those who cannot work from home and our vital services.
This programme is crucial given that around 1 in 3 people have coronavirus without displaying any symptoms, and will enable more people who have the virus to be identified sooner to break the chains of transmission.
The programme is aimed at those without symptoms and who cannot work from home during lockdown.
Companies with over 50 employees can register on gov.uk to order coronavirus tests for their workforces. Organisations with fewer than 50 staff, sole traders, the self-employed, or members of the public, should visit their local authority’s website for further information about their testing services.
Building on the testing from November and December 2020, our next phase of readiness is now underway, ensuring we are in the best place possible to support the flow of trade in and out of Great Britain in 2021 and beyond. We have just completed a thorough validation of all our policies, process maps, legislative tools, and IT systems to ensure we have everything in place for the remainder of our testing and to facilitate the import changes being introduced from 1 April. Over the next few weeks we will continue a series of desk-top exercises to model and test the feasibility of the processes before conducting a number of practical tests in a live environment.
SPS Readiness reaches across a breadth of government departments, delivery partners, local authorities and of course industry and associations. We will continue to work with the business community by continuing to engage key sectoral forums, in order to ensure messages reach the widest audience. We will report on the findings from our tests and share these with all our test partners. We will also share key learning at each stage with a wide group. At various stages in the readiness programme, we will be inviting industry to take part in the process and to observe the process, with aim of increasing awareness and confidence. Working with and alongside industry is crucial to our success.
The products where SPS documentation will be required will include:
We have commenced a series of webinars designed to support business readiness and will continue these throughout February and March. In addition we will provide updates and bespoke webinars to associations and their members as required or requested.
The groupage guidance for traders and hauliers moving agrifood products from Great Britain (GB) to Northern Ireland (NI) is now on gov.uk.
Our next webinar on importing Products of Animal Origin (POAO) from the European Union to Great Britain is on Monday 15 February from 14:00-15:00 (GMT). It will cover the actions you must take to continue importing POAO from the EU into GB from 1 April 2021, guidance on how to meet the new requirements, useful links to essential information, and a Q&A. Find out more and register online.
A recorded webinar (from 14 Jan) and Q&A on the issues arising from goods moving from Great Britain to the EU via the short straits are available on gov.uk.
The online Trader Showcase site that you’ve been using to find out about the new rules for moving goods to Northern Ireland and exporting to the EU has been migrated to two new locations, which you can access by using the links below:
The new Trader Showcase has been developed using Dropbox Paper, which usually requires users to have an account to access content. We recommend opening a free account – which involves a basic registration process – if you don’t already have one.
The new Trader Showcase site works with most modern browsers, but is best viewed using Chrome, Firefox, Safari and the latest two versions of Edge.
| Webinar | Date | Registration Link |
| Importing Products of Animal Origin (POAO) from the European Union into Great Britain | 15/02/2021 14:00-15:00 | Register here |
| Importing Products of Animal Origin (POAO) from the European Union into Great Britain | 22/02/2021 14:00-15:00 | Register here |
| Importing Products of Animal Origin (POAO) from the European Union into Great Britain- With a focus on Composites | 01/03/2021 14:00-15:00 | Register here |
| Importing Products of Animal Origin (POAO) from the European Union into Great Britain | 08/03/2021 14:00-15:00 | Register here |
| Importing Products of Animal Origin (POAO) from the European Union into Great Britain- With a focus on Composites | 15/03/2021 14:00- 15:00 | Register here |
| Importing Products of Animal Origin (POAO) from the European Union into Great Britain- With a focus on Fish & Fish Products | 22/03/2021 14:00-15:00 | Register here |
| Importing Products of Animal Origin (POAO) from the European Union into Great Britain | 29/03/2021 14:00-15:00 | Register here |
Links to our recorded webinars on the GB to EU Exporter Journey are now available on YouTube. Please share with anyone who may find this information useful. The topics are:
