The FEHD is the licensing authority for food businesses and certain trades in Hong Kong.
Licensing
Restaurants, food factories, fresh provision shops, bakeries, factory canteens, siu mei and lo mei shops, frozen confection factories, milk factories, cold stores and composite food shops are required to obtain licences from the Department.
The Department also issues permits for the sale of restricted foods, such as frozen confections, milk, non-bottled drinks, Chinese herb tea, cut fruit, sushi, sashimi, oysters and meat to be eaten raw, food sold from vending machines, and for operating karaoke establishments in restaurants.
Licences are only issued to food premises which conform to hygiene requirements and safety standards prescribed by the departments concerned.
Trade licences are required for operating places of public entertainment (including theatres, cinemas and entertainment machine centres), commercial bathhouses, private swimming pools, funeral parlours, undertaker businesses, slaughterhouses and offensive trades.
Starting from 1 January 2013, the Department has accepted electronic submission of applications for food business/trade licences and permits.
Provisional Licences
To facilitate the setting up of food businesses, the Department operates a provisional licence system. Premises that satisfy all essential health, building and fire safety requirements are issued with a provisional licence valid for six months, during which the licensee has to complete all outstanding requirements for the issue of a full licence.
In 2019, the Department received 3,965 applications for provisional food business licences and 3,348 provisional licences were issued. An applicant can obtain a provisional licence from the Licence Issuing Office within one working day if all the essential licensing requirements are met.
Licences Processed and Issued
Licence applications are handled by three licensing offices located on Hong Kong Island, in Kowloon and the New Territories.
Food business licence applications received and processed during the year totalled 4,062 (including 1,857 for restaurant licences). In addition, there were 1,328 applications for restricted food permits (including 208 restricted food permits for online sale), 3,229 applications for places of public entertainment licences, and 46 applications for other trade licences.
To cater for the specific needs of the food trade, seminars on restaurant licensing are arranged on a bi-monthly basis for those who have applied for restaurant licences or are considering starting a restaurant business.
Liquor Licences
To sell liquor for consumption on the premises, a licence is required from the Liquor Licensing Board (LLB) which is an independent statutory body.
The Board normally meets once a week to deal with contested cases. In exercising its statutory powers, the Board regularly reviews the policy governing the issue of liquor licences and the control of licensed premises. The Department provides executive and secretarial support to the Board.
During the year, 1,066 applications for new liquor and club liquor licences were received and 1,133 new licences were granted. A total of 5,127 liquor and club liquor licences were renewed.
The Dutiable Commodities (Liquor) (Amendment) Regulation 2015, which came into operation on 3 August 2015, extended the maximum validity period of a liquor licence from one year to two years, giving LLB the flexibility in granting liquor-licensed premises with good track record for at least two consecutive years prior to the renewal of licence for licence renewal by two years. The number of valid liquor licences granted for two years as at 31 December 2019 is 4,175.
The Board regularly arranges seminars on liquor licensing to enable applicants and licensees to update their knowledge of the legal liabilities and responsibilities for the proper management of their premises. Since 1 January 2014, the content of the seminar has been enriched to also cover topics of fire safety, public order and environmental hygiene. During the year, 12 sessions were organised, and 507 liquor licence applicants and licensees attended the sessions.
Inspections
Health inspectors perform regular inspections on licensed food premises to ensure that licence holders comply with licensing requirements and conditions as well as hygiene standards prescribed under the law. In addition to routine inspections, supervisory inspections are conducted by senior officers. Premises issued with trade licences, such as cinemas, commercial bathhouses and private swimming pools, are also regularly checked by health inspectors.
The Department adopts a Risk-based Inspection System to regulate licensed food premises. Inspection frequencies vary according to the risk and hygiene standards of licensed food premises. Inspections focus on food safety and health education, in addition to general sanitary conditions.
Law Enforcement
Food business operators, who breach public health laws, face prosecution. Under the Demerit Points System, they also bear the risk of licence suspension or cancellation if they breach the law persistently. Under the Warning Letter System, licences may also be cancelled as a result of repeated breach of licensing requirements or conditions.
The Department also cracks down on unlicensed food businesses by taking out prosecution and, for persistent offenders, by summary arrest and applying to court for closure of their premises.
With the prevalence of e-commerce, buying and selling of food via the internet or social media platforms have become popular in recent years, posing challenges to the regulatory control of the food trade. The Department has been monitoring online food sale activities since mid-2012. If an unlicensed food business is suspected to be involved in manufacturing and selling any food, including restricted food items, for human consumption online, or the food is from a suspicious source, the Department will conduct investigations and take follow-up action, including covert operations to collect evidence. Should there be sufficient evidence, prosecution will be taken. Publicity, including broadcast of Television and Radio Announcements in the Public Interest, will continue to increase public awareness of food safety when purchasing food online and remind the online food trade to apply for food business licences or permits according to relevant regulations.
To further safeguard food safety, a new set of permits for regulation of operators selling "restricted foods" (such as meat, milk, sashimi, sushi and oysters to be eaten in raw state) online without physical premises are available for application with effect from 22 February 2016. Under the new licensing conditions, the permit holders are required to ensure that the foods are obtained from lawful sources and kept in hygienic condition and stored at safe and appropriate temperature during transportation. Operators should also provide permit information on their websites for consumers' reference and verification at the Department's website.
To enhance food safety, the Department has prepared the new Shell Fish (Hairy Crab) Permit for application by the operators selling hairy crabs starting from 16 July 2018. The permit requires that premises selling hairy crabs must comply with the relevant hygiene requirements, and hairy crabs for sale must be obtained from lawful sources accompanied with health certificates issued by the relevant authority of the exporting country and acceptable to the Director of Food and Environmental Hygiene and kept in a refrigerator.
The Department is responsible for issuing factory canteen licences and enforcing regulatory control of the factory canteens. A warning letter will be issued to the licensee of the factory canteen if it is observed that the licensing requirements/conditions concerning the display of notices and restriction on the provision of service to factory employees of the same industrial building only has been breached. If there is sufficient evidence for the latter, i.e. a factory canteen is found entertaining members of the public, FEHD may consider taking out prosecution against the licensee of the factory canteen for operating an unlicensed restaurant. In 2019, the Department issued 28 prosecutions against licensees of factory canteens serving the public.
In view of the proliferation of unauthorised extension of business area by some food premises in various districts, the Department has since mid-2013 implemented a series of enhanced regulatory measures to boost the effectiveness and efficiency in taking enforcement actions against illegal extension of food business area by recalcitrant offenders. These include more frequent inspections and stepping up prosecutions (including considering to apply for closure orders); speeding up the execution of licence suspension/ cancellation; and imposing additional licensing requirements. The Department has also set up three squads of Food Business Extension Control Task Force (the Task Force) to deal with the problem. The Task Force monitors closely the food premises in locations with a history of illegal extension of business area throughout the peak business hours during weekdays and holidays and takes stringent enforcement actions, including arrest and prosecution of offenders and seizure of the articles used. With the enhanced regulatory measures and enforcement actions, the extent of illegal extension of business area by food premises has receded significantly.
Statistics on Enforcement Actions against Licensed and Unlicensed Food Premises in 2019
| Licensed food premises | |
|---|---|
| No. of licensed food premises | 30,117 |
| No. of inspections | 192,534 |
| No. of prosecutions | 2,837 |
| No. of licence suspensions | 100 |
| No. of licence cancellations | 1 |
| Unlicensed food premises (including unlicensed food premises conducting online food sale activities) | |
| No. of prosecutions | 4,194 |
Hygiene Manager/Hygiene Supervisor Scheme
The Hygiene Manager (HM) and Hygiene Supervisor (HS) Scheme seeks to strengthen food safety supervision on food premises. Under the Scheme, all large food establishments and food establishments producing high-risk food are required to appoint an HM and an HS. All other food establishments are required to appoint either an HM or an HS. For individual licences of food premises which are under the same licensee and housed in the same supermarket or food court, the Department accepts nomination of the same person as the HM or HS.
There are a number of local academic institutions and vocational training centres offering HM or HS courses that are recognised by the Department. The duration of an HM course is about 16 to 20 hours and that of an HS course is about six hours. The Department has been providing free HS training courses for supervisory staff of licensed food premises since December 2001. By the end of 2019, the Department has provided a total of 2,557 courses for 131,269 HSs, while 53,037 HMs were trained by academic institutions and vocational training centres.
Slaughterhouses
Hong Kong's fresh meat (beef, pork and mutton) is supplied by three licensed slaughterhouses in Sheung Shui, Tsuen Wan and Cheung Chau (the one in Cheung Chau closed on 1 October 2019). The Department monitors the operation of licensed slaughterhouses to ensure that hygiene and environmental standards are met, and combats illegal slaughtering activities.
To protect public health, all food animals admitted to licensed slaughterhouses are subject to both ante-mortem and post-mortem inspections. These ensure that meat is fit for human consumption before being released for sale in markets. During the year, the Department mounted 12 raids and surveillance operations on suspected illegal slaughterhouses. A total of 3,438 surprise visits to fresh provision shops and market meat stalls were also made to prevent the sale of meat from non-approved sources. The Department also keeps an eye out for the malpractices of selling frozen or chilled meat as fresh meat and displaying frozen or chilled meat for sale without proper refrigeration.