UKHospitality: Free-from flexibility

Allergens continue to be an important topic for contract caterers, who like UKHospitality will be waiting anxiously for the response to the Food Standards Agency (FSA)’s recent consultation on the subject. That response is expected in the near-future, and we’re hoping the proposals we put forward as part of the consultation – on best practice guidance for allergen information for non-pre-packed foods – have been taken onboard.

Essentially, we’d like to see flexibility underpinning allergen advice. UKHospitality believes that contract caterers – and, of course, the hospitality venues that are their customers – should be able to develop allergen management plans that are best suited to their own operations and therefore their own customers.

In our response to the consultation, we made the importance hospitality businesses, including contract caterers, place on allergen management clear to the FSA. At the same time, however, we were keen to stress the sort of differences in operations that exist across the sector, and how a one-size-fits-all approach simply wouldn’t be appropriate. Indeed, such inflexibility could undermine the very purpose of the guidance.  

We also suggested – and this is of particular interest to contract caterers – that the guidance take a whole supply chain approach, as a way of improving the flow of information that reaches hospitality businesses at the end of the chain. Because keeping customers safe is hospitality’s number one priority, our sector has seen a concentrated focus on allergen management in recent years, which has been backed up with significant investment from businesses.

However, UKHospitality is firm in its view that flexibility to provide allergen information based on business type should underpin the guidance, because what works for a restaurant providing table service might not necessarily work for a small, independent café serving takeaway coffee. Yes, the draft guidance does, up to a point, acknowledge operational differences, but we would urge the FSA make it a key principle of any new guidance.

Guidance that also presents a perfect opportunity to adopt a whole supply chain approach, because an enduring problem for hospitality businesses, and one that contract caterers are no doubt familiar with, is the unpredictability that often exists in the supply chain. The fact is that kitchens frequently have to use different ingredients in products, or, in some cases, find alternatives with which to substitute products completely. Ensuring that ingredient, allergen or product information is ‘live’ and bang up to date would be extremely useful for those hospitality businesses at the end of the supply chain, so guidance for suppliers to actively inform end users is something we’d certainly encourage.

UKHospitality and its members recognise that this is very important guidance, and we’re pleased to have been involved closely with the FSA in helping to shape it in a way that it will work for all hospitality businesses, which is why flexibility is so vital. As we await the response to the consultation, our dialogue with the FSA, with which we have a close working relationship, is continuing, so that the collective voice of hospitality is heard.

You may also be interested in…