Two proposed imported food notices

About this consultation

New Zealand Food Safety invite comments on 2 proposed notices:

• Food Notice: Requirements for Registered Importers and Imported Food for Sale
• Food Notice: Laboratories Approved for Testing Imported Food.

This consultation would have been of interest to registered food importers and brokers importing food on behalf of food businesses, in particular, those involved in the importation of bovine meat and meat products.

The consultation closed at 5pm on 23 August 2022.

Consultation documents

Draft Food Notice: Requirements for Registered Importers and Imported Food for Sale [PDF, 519 KB]

Draft Food Notice: Laboratories Approved for Testing Imported Food [PDF, 241 KB]

Discussion Paper – Proposed Food Notice: Requirements for Registered Importers and Imported Food for Sale [PDF, 342 KB]

Related documents

NZL 690 SPS Notification Food Notice: Requirements for Registered Food Importers and Imported Food for Sale [PDF, 110 KB]

What was proposed?

The 2 proposed notices were to replace an existing notice – Food Notice: Importing Food.

1. Food Notice: Requirements for Registered Food Importers and Imported for Food for Sale

The proposed changes to requirements included the addition of:

• Part 3 – requirements regarding the assessment and confirmation of the safety and suitability of food for import into New Zealand, the transport and storage of imported food, and record keeping by registered importers.
• Part 5 – requirements that clarify the different types of evidence that may be used for clearance of High Regulatory and Increased Regulatory food and the information they must contain
• Part 6 – import requirements for bovine meat and bovine meat products.

The proposed changes were to help importers better understand the requirements and how they could be met. Detailed explanations of the proposed changes were in the discussion paper.

2. Food Notice: Laboratories Approved for Testing Imported Food

This draft notice specified the New Zealand laboratories approved for testing of imported food and the conditions of their approval. All requirements that applied to approved laboratories were transferred from the current Food Notice: Importing Food to this proposed notice. The list of approved laboratories and conditions of approval were unchanged. 

Submissions are public information

Note that all, part, or a summary of your submission may be published on this website. Most often this happens when we issue a document that reviews the submissions received.

People can also ask for copies of submissions under the Official Information Act 1982 (OIA). The OIA says we must make the content of submissions available unless we have good reason for withholding it. Those reasons are detailed in sections 6 and 9 of the OIA.

If you think there are grounds to withhold specific information from publication, make this clear in your submission or contact us. Reasons may include that it discloses commercially sensitive or personal information. However, any decision MPI makes to withhold details can be reviewed by the Ombudsman, who may direct us to release it.

Official Information Act 1982 – NZ Legislation