Food safety and hygiene requirements
We work together with businesses that produce, prepare and/or serve food, to ensure hygiene and food safety regulations are met and that the public is not exposed to contaminated, unsafe or incorrectly labelled foodstuffs.
Ensuring the safety of the public
All food traders, whether formal or informal, have to comply with strict hygiene regulations and by-laws around the handling and storing of food. You can find all these regulations and guidelines on this page. We also run a number of food safety programmes and offer a range of services to assist the implementation of these health and food safety regulations.
The City monitors the safety of food products supplied by formal or informal businesses in the following ways:
- Business licensing and issuing of Certificates of Acceptability
- Certificates of acceptability for dairy farms
- Unannounced inspections and food sampling
- Investigating reports of food poisoning or food-borne illnesses
- Investigating other complaints and concerns related to foodstuffs
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Health and food safety regulations and guides
For legal hygiene requirements for food premises and transporting of food, please see the Regulations Governing General Hygiene Requirements for Food Premises, the Transport of Food and Related Matters – R968 of 2018 and all other national legislation and guidelines for food safety, food control and food health on the National Department of Health’s website.
Food hygiene guidelines for informal traders or hawkers can be found in:
Guidelines for Informal Food Trading/Hawking
For information on the procedures followed by the City of Cape Town’s Environmental Health Practitioners (EHPs) during inspections of food premises and sampling of food products, you can consult:
For milk safety requirements and what the City is doing to ensure our milk is healthy, read:
For rules around the keeping of livestock and poultry, see:
Policy for the Keeping of Animals and Poultry for the City Of Cape Town
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You can also download the following documents:
City of Cape Town Animal By-Law, 2010
City of Cape Town's Environmental Health By-Law – Gn 6041 Of 2003
Urban Agricultural Policy for the City of Cape Town (2006)
Please note
You can report food or food service-related complaints to our Health Department.
Licencing and certifying your food business
If you still need to apply for a licence or certification for your food business, visit City Connect: .
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