The Board had agreed on the scope of the Future of Food Regulation program in March 2026. Areas targeted for reform include food business registration, regulation of large food businesses, guidance for local authorities and industry, enforcement powers, and consumer access to food hygiene information.

FSA Outlines Vision for Future Food Regulation

In a September 2026 report to the Board, FSA said the future system should be “effective, resilient, and trusted,” while ensuring that food is safe and authentic. The agency emphasized that a national approach for some large businesses must be developed alongside stronger local delivery by food safety and standards officers with local expertise.

FSA outlined six intended outcomes for the program:

1. Enhanced food business registration
2. Different regulatory pathways based on business characteristics
3. Greater use of data and intelligence-sharing
4. Improved guidance
5. Revised enforcement tools and powers
6. Greater transparency around food hygiene, including mandatory display of Food Hygiene Ratings online across the UK and at physical establishments in England.

Reforms Driven by Influence of Large Retailers

Central to FSA's rationale for national oversight is the scale and influence of major food businesses. Although nearly 600,000 UK food businesses are predominantly micro-, small-, or medium-sized, ten large retailers together account for nearly 97 percent of the retail market. FSA argued that decisions made by these businesses at the national level can have significant effects on consumers and supply chains, and that greater use of centrally available business data for large retailers could provide earlier visibility into system-wide risks.

Under the proposed system, local authorities would continue to oversee the vast majority of food businesses. FSA has also stressed that introducing national regulation for large businesses should not be used as a reason to reduce resources available to local authorities.

The proposals build partly on an earlier FSA proof-of-concept trial examining an alternative approach to regulating large supermarket chains, in which five major retailers participated. Attention was shifted from individual premises inspections toward centralized monitoring of food safety management data for these businesses. FSA examined performance trends across participating retailers and identified potential improvements to food safety systems, concluding that the approach could provide comparable or greater insight into compliance than routine local authority inspections alone.

Two National Oversight Models Advance for Further Development

During a policy design process, FSA considered six potential frameworks for national regulation of large food businesses. The agency recommended advancing two approaches to detailed design: FSA Direct Assurance and FSA as Competent Authority:

• Under the Direct Assurance model, large businesses would submit data and audit evidence directly to FSA, which would operate a national assurance function. Local authorities would remain the competent authorities and would use FSA's assurance activities to inform their regulatory work.
• The more structurally significant Competent Authority model would give FSA direct national oversight of applicable large businesses, including stronger intervention powers. In its assessment, FSA said this approach offered the greatest alignment with the program's objectives and represented the only option considered that would deliver full structural reform.

The agency will now develop both frameworks into more detailed regulatory models, examining issues including legislative and data requirements, registration, Food Hygiene Rating Scheme changes, guidance, local authority delivery, and long-term resource sustainability. FSA said it will use this process to further test its underlying assumption that some large businesses should receive national oversight while most businesses remain locally regulated.