Opening a new restaurant is no small feat. You’ve poured your heart and soul into the perfect concept and created a delectable menu. Before you open the doors of your restaurant, you need to acquire a food permit.
Acquiring all of the necessary food licenses and permits involves a lot of paperwork and patience. It takes time for each and every one to be approved.
It’s not fun, but it is absolutely necessary. This guide covers the licenses and permits needed to open a restaurant in all major cities of Pakistan.
Food Business in Punjab
PITB has collaborated with the Punjab Food Authority to launch a ‘Smart Food Licensing System’ to facilitate food business operators in applying for a license. Besides enabling food businesses to apply for licenses, the mobile application is available publicly on both android and iOS platforms and can also be used by the general public to register food quality and hygiene related complaints against eateries. The application has an interface for PFA officials through which they can validate requests for new food licenses after field visits or conduct inspections on public complaints. The system is also integrated with a banking platform in order to monitor financial transactions related to license fee and fine payments. Since the launch of the Smart Food Licensing System in January this year, over Rs. 44 million have been collected against food license fee payments.
Food Business in Sindh
Under the provisions of section 19 of the Sindh Food Authority Act, 2016 every food operator is required to obtain a license to run a food business.
Under section 36 of Sindh Food Authority Act, if a food operator manufactures, sells, offers for sale, stores or distributes or imports any food without the prescribed registration or license, he/she shall be liable to imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year and or fine which may extend to five hundred thousand rupees or with both.
You can click on the following link to download the registration form.
http://sfa.gos.pk/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/License-Form-2.pdf
Food Business in KPK
Any person desirous of obtaining a license for commencing or using any premises for food business under the Act and these regulations may apply for the grant of a license in writing to the Authority stating the-
- kind of food or products likely to be handled
- processes to which the food is subject; and
- dimensions of the business
You can click on the following link to download the registration form.