Britain and the European Union have agreed a draft deal that would remove most post-Brexit border checks on food and farm goods, in what is being described as the most significant part of the wider reset in relations between London and Brussels. The UK government estimates the deal will eventually be worth £5.1 billion a year to the economy.
According to the BBC, which first reported the agreement, a draft text of around 200 pages covering sanitary and phytosanitary rules has been circulated to EU member states for consideration at a meeting of EU ambassadors on Wednesday. The rules govern animal health, plant health and food safety in trade.
For exporters, the practical change would be sweeping. The draft would remove the need for export health certificates costing around £200 each, phytosanitary certificates priced at about £25, and a range of related charges including inspector fees, organic certification costs, some port fees and sampling fees. Checks that have slowed shipments since Britain left the EU’s single market would fall away for trade in both directions.
Several product lines blocked since the new border regime took effect would be able to resume. Under the draft, UK exports of fresh sausages and burgers, shellfish from domestic waters and seed potatoes to the EU could restart. The agreement would also bring back pet passports for animals travelling from Britain into the EU, ending a system that has required fresh veterinary documents for each trip.
In return, Britain would commit to following and adapting to existing EU rules on plant, animal and food trade standards, a system known as dynamic alignment. The King’s Speech in May 2026 announced a European Partnership Bill to give ministers the powers to do so, and a Commons committee report expects the food and carbon deals to be running by mid-2027.
The food deal has particular significance for Northern Ireland, whose post-Brexit arrangement kept it inside the EU’s single market for goods. Food products from elsewhere in the UK currently need paperwork and some physical checks when they arrive at Northern Irish ports, and the new agreement would radically reduce that burden.
The draft sits alongside separate texts on linking emissions trading systems and on a youth travel and work scheme, plus a draft joint statement for leaders. The next checkpoint is Wednesday’s meeting of EU ambassadors, and the wider reset will be tested at leader level at a UK-EU summit later this month.
Business groups have broadly welcomed the direction of travel, arguing that the paperwork costs of the current system fall hardest on small exporters. The deal is not yet final, and the details published so far are subject to negotiation, but if it clears the ambassador stage and the summit, it would mark the biggest easing of post-Brexit food trade barriers since Britain left the single market.
