Guidance

Sustainable procurement: the GBS for food and catering services

Official Government Buying Standards (GBS) for food and catering services

• From: Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs
• Published: 1 July 2014
• Last updated: 18 August 2021 — See all updates

Documents

Government Buying Standard for food and catering services

HTML

Nutrition standards: technical guidance

PDF, 677 KB, 61 pages

Annex to GBS for food and catering services

PDF, 29.4 KB, 2 pages

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Details

All government departments and their related organisations must make sure that they meet the minimum mandatory Government Buying Standards (GBS) when buying goods and services. We also encourage the wider public sector to specify the minimum mandatory standards in tenders.

We encourage everyone to meet the best practice standards, which go further than the mandatory standards.

The product specifications set out in the GBS are aimed primarily at public sector organisations procuring goods or services. However, any organisation concerned about sustainable procurement may choose to follow them or to specify them in tenders.

Published 1 July 2014
Last updated 18 August 2021 + show all updates

1. 18 August 2021

   Added the technical guidance for nutrition standards.

2. 15 July 2021

   We've updated the Government Buying Standard for food and catering.

3. 27 March 2015

   Buying Standards document has been updated to clarify the best practice criterion for sugar sweetened beverages – the criteria have not changed.

4. 1 July 2014

   First published.