What food businesses need to know about the UK–EU SPS agreement

The UK–EU Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) agreement is a proposed new deal between the UK and the EU that aims to significantly reduce border friction.

Brexit meant that imports and exports of plant and animal products, particularly food and animal feed, involved many new checks, inspections, and documents. Some products, such as sausages and seed potatoes, couldn’t be exported from the UK to the EU at all.

The new agreement aims to change all that.

The hope is to save time and costs and promote UK economic growth. Reaching an agreement will mean that the UK and EU will once again align their food laws, and that will affect all UK food producers, whether they export to the EU or not.

Is the re-set agreed?

Not yet. In political terms, the UK and EU have reached a common understanding of what a new Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) agreement might look like. Officials are now negotiating the details of the agreement. If those negotiations conclude successfully, the final text of the SPS agreement will be contained in a treaty.

In the UK, treaties must be approved by the Westminster Parliament before they can be signed. And the contents of a treaty – which is international law – only becomes part of the domestic law of the UK once an Act of the Westminster Parliament makes it so.

A Bill intended to give effect to the terms of an SPS agreement will amount to an important constitutional change for the UK, and we can expect its passage through the House of Commons and the House of Lords to be an interesting and controversial one.

It is expected that a Bill will be published in the King’s Speech, marking the State Opening of Parliament on Wednesday 13 May 2026, with the Government indicating that it hopes that the new SPS agreement will take effect from mid-2027.

What will a final agreement contain?

While what emerges from the UK-EU negotiating rounds should reflect the broad aims of the political agreement, we can expect the give-and-take of negotiation to contort and stretch what the politicians thought they had agreed.

The aim, certainly, will be to secure free movement of animals, animal products, plants and plant products between the UK and the EU without the plethora of certificates and controls - and the resulting costs and delays – which presently apply to these movements.

How will the UK and EU realign their Food Laws?

The UK will need to pass an Act of the Westminster Parliament to align Food Law in Great Britain (England, Wales, and Scotland) with EU Food Law once again.

The precise way in which the Act will do this remains to be seen. Still, we can expect it to contain a mix of detailed provisions tying Great Britain to certain EU laws immediately (latest indications are that there may not be much of a transition period) and other provisions which give powers to ministers, including ministers in the devolved nations of Scotland and Wales, to do so later, by passing new regulations in specific areas such as food additives or food labelling. Northern Ireland is already aligned with EU Food Law through the Windsor Framework, and that is not expected to change in any material way.

We know from the political agreement that the UK and EU intend, subject to certain exceptions, UK and EU Food Law to be dynamically aligned. Put simply, this means that whenever the EU changes its Food Law, UK Food Law will automatically change to follow suit. This will be a controversial matter for the Westminster Parliament. Dynamic alignment means that new laws will apply in the UK without MPs being able to vote on them. Instead, what is anticipated is a system described as decision ‘shaping’.

This will involve the UK being given advance notice of proposed EU laws and being able to express its views on the nature and content. Still, the UK will have no role in negotiating, finalising, or adopting those EU laws. This will be a similar system to the one which the EU currently operates with the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) states, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.

What might the EU want?

In the event of any conflict between EU Food Law and UK Food Law, we can expect the EU to insist that EU law prevails over UK law. The EU will want this to be the case whether the UK Food Law was adopted before or after the SPS agreement takes effect.

We can also expect the EU to insist that, where any question about the interpretation of EU Food Law arises in the UK, the ultimate authority as to what EU Food Law means is the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU).

The EU will also want to ensure that the UK’s ability to prevent EU food and animal feed from being moved into, and sold, in the UK is extremely limited, with perhaps only a very limited right to temporarily suspend imports from the EU in the case of a serious risk to human or animal health.

Money will matter, too. If the UK is to regain its access to some of the EU’s agencies, systems, and databases – for instance, the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) – the EU will want a UK contribution to the cost of running those things.

What might the UK want?

The UK will want to ensure it regains full and unconditional access to the valuable EU food export market without any friction at the border, such as export health certificates or physical inspections.

The UK will also be keen to ensure that, so far as new or amended EU Food Law is concerned, it has a way of ‘shaping’ that law, accepting that the UK will no longer be a full member of the EU and will no longer be able to participate in decision-making through the EU’s institutions.

Closely associated with this will be the UK’s wish to ensure that it is given as much advance notice of new EU Food Law as possible, so that UK food businesses have as much time to prepare for changes as their European counterparts.

The UK will, no doubt, press strongly for access to valuable EU systems such as RASFF, and for the free sharing of scientific and other insights with policymakers in the EU, enriching the quality of information for the benefit of all parties.

How long will food businesses get to prepare?

This is tricky. Like jumping on the merry-go-round while it is spinning, there is a possibility that certain EU Food Laws will apply in the UK with little advance notice. The latest indications from the UK Government are that a formal transition period is not a given; the Government has committed only to working with businesses to ensure a smooth transition.

Beyond the challenges of actual legal realignment, practical difficulties are already making themselves felt as the UK begins to cater for expected changes in its Food Law arrangements.

For example, the EU’s ban on the use of Bisphenol A in food packaging was adopted on 19 December 2024, giving EU businesses until 20 July 2026 to phase it out. The UK, which has recently consulted on adopting a similar ban, proposes to implement the legislation to mirror the EU’s timetable, but without the lead time that EU businesses enjoyed. While this neatly anticipates alignment, it pays little heed to the need of UK businesses to have a reasonable period of warning for the implementation of what will be a significant packaging change.

What should food businesses do now?

If you’re a food business, we recommend that you take stock of all food law which applies to you – perhaps through a regulatory audit – and identify whether, for each regulatory provision which affects you, there has been divergence between the UK and EU in the period since Brexit.

If there has been divergence, you may, depending upon the precise technical details, need to make changes to your recipes, processes, wrapping and packaging to get ready for EU Food Law applying in the UK once again.