The hygienic certificate — a document once widely sought as proof of a facility's or product's sanitary conformity — no longer exists in Georgian law. The current food safety code replaces this instrument with a different, modern system: registration as a business operator, approval where required, and permanent mechanisms of state control. On this page we explain what has replaced the hygienic certificate and which obligations you carry, as a business operator, in the sphere of hygiene and safety.
What replaced the hygienic certificate
The abolition of the hygienic certificate means that instead of one-off documentary proof, the law demands a continuous, accountable status: a person who produces, processes, or distributes food must be registered as a business operator, and its activity must conform to statutory requirements at every stage. Where approval is required, that status is granted on the basis of inspection results — and inspection is precisely the mechanism that once performed the certifying function. This approach allows the state to supervise real processes rather than a document, and it shifts the center of gravity of hygiene compliance onto the operator's own continuous systems.
Registration as a business operator
A business operator must carry out, in the manner established by legislation, the registration of the relevant activity in the register of economic activities. Upon starting or ceasing the activity, or changing any registered data connected with it, the operator must apply to the National Agency of Public Registry to amend the register. Carrying on activity as a business operator without registration is prohibited — and from the hygiene perspective this rule is decisive, since registration is what connects an enterprise to the control system.
Mandatory approval — who it covers
Approval is a distinct institution. Mandatory approval applies to a business operator whose activity is connected with: the production and/or processing of food of animal origin; the production, processing, and/or placing on the market of animal feed defined by government decree; non-food products of animal origin defined by government decree; and the sphere of plant protection defined by government decree. Approval is carried out by the agency on the basis of inspection results, according to rules approved by government decree, and operating an activity subject to approval without approval is prohibited.
At the same time, the law provides exceptions for food of animal origin: approval is not required for an operator carrying out family production; primary production; production or processing using traditional methods; non-factory production in high mountain regions; direct supply of primary products to final consumers or consumer-facing retail points with small business status; direct supply of meat of poultry and lagomorphs slaughtered on the farm, or of game, with small business status; storage of food not requiring temperature control; and certain retail formats. The agency may, at the operator's request, approve an activity not subject to mandatory approval.
Types of state control
Supervision over hygiene and safety is organized along three lines. The first is food/feed safety control — action taken to establish conformity with safety and labeling requirements, and with requirements for providing consumers with information about food. The second is veterinary control — action establishing conformity with requirements in the veterinary sphere. The third is phytosanitary control — action establishing conformity with phytosanitary requirements in the sphere of plant protection. Together these three types define the perimeter within which hygiene obligations are verified.
Mechanisms of state control
The types of control are implemented through concrete mechanisms: inspection, monitoring, supervision, documentary checks, sampling, and audit. Inspection is a mechanism under which individual aspects of the production, processing, and distribution stages are examined without prior warning to the business operator — it includes checking the operator's activity, a documentary check, and sampling with testing in an accredited laboratory. Monitoring consists of planned observations and measurements under the annual state control program, which must take into account: cases of food poisoning in the population and in animals, food-borne intestinal infections, epidemics, and other mass food-related diseases in previous years; cases of microbiological, chemical, or physical contamination; cases of environmental pollution; cases of consumer deception and misleading; and comparative analysis of the agency's activities in the reporting and previous years.
Supervision means observation of a business operator's actions — the destruction of food, the prevention of market placement, withdrawal from the market and from consumers, and the execution of the agency's instructions. Sampling is carried out to examine organoleptic, microbiological, parasitological, toxicological, physico-chemical, radiological, disease-related, and other indicators, in order to determine the expected risk to human and animal health and life; it may occur during inspection, supervision, or monitoring, or independently.
Audit and delegation
Audit differs from ordinary inspection: it applies to food safety procedures implemented in accordance with the principles of good hygiene practice and the hazard analysis and critical control points (HACCP) system, and it determines whether the operator's actions and results conform to its own planned measures, and whether those measures are effective and meet the set objectives. Individual tasks connected with state control may also be delegated to a controlling body — but only where the tasks are precisely described and the controlling body is impartial and free from conflicts of interest. A controlling body must be accredited by the relevant body of Georgia or of a member country of the European Union or the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. This system — not a once-issued certificate — is what guarantees hygiene requirements today, and your enterprise's readiness for these mechanisms is the real proof of hygienic conformity.