The Environmental Health Department has a legal duty to enforce the Food Hygiene (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2006 and the laws associated with it.
We ensure that all food and drink intended for human consumption by Derry City and Strabane District Council’s food businesses is produced, stored and handled without risk to the health and safety of the consumer. These inspections include restaurants, cafes, pubs, hotels, supermarkets and food manufacturers.
Environmental Health Officers from the Food Team carry out a number of functions in relation to food safety. These include food hygiene inspections.
A number of approaches are used to ensure food businesses conform with the legislation:-
We proactively inspect Derry City and Strabane District Council’s food businesses to ensure compliance with the law. Inspections are carried out, as far as possible, without prior notification and inspections are undertaken at intervals that are determined by a risk rating applied to the business, so that those premises that present the greatest risk are inspected most frequently. Generally this interval will be between 6 months and five years.
During an inspection, officers will want to reassure themselves that potential that potential food safety risks have been identified by the business, and that there are adequate controls in place to prevent any problems. They will also look at the training of managers and food handlers to ensure that it is suitable, and they will check that the condition of the premises and equipment is satisfactory.
Where practices or conditions are not satisfactory, every attempt will be made to resolve the situation by informal means, but where poor conditions persist, or where there is a risk to public health it may be necessary to resort to formal action. This could involve either the service of legal notice, prosecution, or in extreme cases closure of the business.
We use educational techniques as well as legal means to achieve compliance i.e. training, seminars, workshops.
Food Hygiene Rating Scheme
The National Food Hygiene Rating Scheme (FHRS) for England, Wales and Northern Ireland, is a Food Standards Agency (FSA)/local authority partnership initiative. The Food Hygiene Rating given reflects the inspection findings and the scheme will help consumers choose where to eat out or shop for food by giving the information about the hygiene standards in restaurants, pubs, cafes, takeaways, and hotels, as well as supermarkets and other food shops.
For further information on the Scheme go to the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme
Food Safety Management System
HACCP which means means Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points. This is a process that helps you look at how you handle food and introduce procedures to make sure the food you produce is safe to eat.
If you run a small catering or food retail businesses, there are packs available from the FSA to help you put in place a food safety management system. The following packs can be found via the links below, or you can contact this Department for more information:
Related Pages
Food Safety Management System/HACCP
Contact Details
For further information contact
Food Team on 02871 253253