Food and drug law in Georgia rests on the Law on Food/Feed Safety and Veterinary and Plant Protection — commonly called the food safety code — which unites the spheres of food, veterinary matters, and plant protection. If your business involves producing, importing, or distributing food, or bringing agricultural preparations into the country, this page sets out the core statutory requirements. One boundary should be stated early and plainly: medicinal products for human use are regulated by separate legislation outside this code — so what follows concerns food, animal feed, and preparations of agricultural and veterinary significance.
The purpose and scope of the code
The code aims to protect human life and health, consumer interests, animal health and welfare, and plant health, and to define unified principles of state regulation and an effective system of state control in the spheres of food/feed safety, veterinary medicine, and plant protection. The code applies to the production, processing, and distribution of food/feed, animals, plants, and animal and plant products carried out on the territory of Georgia, as well as to primary production, animal health and welfare, plant health, veterinary preparations, pesticides, and agrochemicals.
A special regime applies at the border: food/feed safety control, veterinary control, and phytosanitary control connected with the movement of goods across the customs border of Georgia — import, re-export, export, and transit — is regulated by this code, the Customs Code, and other relevant normative acts. The code establishes the basic principles and requirements of safety, the types of state control, general traceability requirements across production, processing, and distribution, the competences of authorized bodies, the obligations of business operators, and export and import requirements, together with liability for breaches.
Simplified requirements and family production
The code contemplates simplified requirements, set by government decree, for business operators with small business status who supply primary products directly to final consumers or to a retail point supplying final consumers directly; for those using traditional production methods; and for those carrying out non-factory production in high mountain regions. In addition, state control of food under the code does not extend to production and primary production by a natural person qualifying as a family production subject — although within veterinary and phytosanitary control, the provisions connected with such a subject still apply. This calibration of scope matters when you assess which regime your operation falls under.