Do coffee roasters need a HACCP plan?

UK food businesses must have a food safety management system based on HACCP principles, proportionate to their size. For a roastery that is a short written plan with records.

What are the critical control points in coffee roasting?

Usually foreign body removal: destoning green coffee and, where fitted, metal detection or magnets on packed or ground product. Your own hazard analysis decides.

Is acrylamide a legal limit for coffee?

No. The 400 micrograms per kilogram for roasted coffee is a benchmark level used to judge whether mitigation is working, not a maximum level. Roasters must still apply mitigation measures.

Can I use Safer Food Better Business?

Safer Food Better Business packs are written for caterers and retailers. A roastery that manufactures and packs coffee usually needs a plan built around its own process, though the record sheets can be adapted.

A HACCP plan for a coffee roastery, hazard by hazard

Coffee is a low-risk food, which is exactly why roasters underestimate the plan. Here are the process steps, the hazards that genuinely apply, the controls an inspector expects and the records that prove them.

9 min read Updated October 9, 2026

Food business operators must put in place, implement and maintain a permanent procedure based on HACCP principles. The requirement comes from Article 5 of Regulation (EC) No 852/2004, retained in UK law. For a roastery that means a written plan, proportionate to the business, that you actually follow and can show records for.

Roasted coffee is a dry, low-moisture food heated well above the temperatures that kill vegetative bacteria, so the microbiological risk is low. The hazards that matter are physical (stones, metal, glass, pests), chemical (acrylamide formed in roasting, mycotoxins from poor storage at origin, cleaning chemicals, allergens in flavored coffee) and, once coffee is ground, staleness and packaging failures that are quality rather than safety issues.

The seven principles, applied

Identify hazards at each step of your process (see the flow below).
Determine critical control points (CCPs): the steps where control is essential to remove or reduce a hazard to an acceptable level. Many roasteries end up with one or two, typically destoning and metal detection or magnets.
Set critical limits for each CCP, for example the destoner running and checked at the start of every session, or the metal detector rejecting a test piece.
Monitor each CCP with a simple check and a record.
Set corrective actions for when a check fails: stop, hold product since the last good check, fix, recheck.
Verify that the plan works: review records weekly, test the detector, review complaints.
Keep documents and records proportionate to the size of the business.

A typical roastery process flow

Worked example

Process steps to assess for hazards

Receive green coffee
Store green coffee
Weigh and load
Destone
Roast
Cool
Degas and store roasted
Grind (if sold ground)
Pack and seal
Label and lot code
Store finished goods
Dispatch

Hazards and controls, step by step

Step	Hazard	Control
Receiving green	Pests, damaged or wet sacks, contaminated vehicle, mold	Approved suppliers, visual check on arrival, reject wet or infested sacks, record lot and condition
Storing green	Pests, damp leading to mold, cross-contamination	Off the floor on pallets, away from walls, dry and ventilated, pest control contract, first in first out
Destoning	Stones, metal, foreign bodies	Destoner on every batch; check stone box; magnets where fitted. Often a CCP
Roasting	Fire; acrylamide formation	Never leave the roaster unattended, chaff cleaning; consistent roast profiles and acrylamide mitigation reviewed under the acrylamide rules
Cooling	Contamination from cooling tray, pests	Clean cooling tray, covered when idle
Grinding	Metal from burr wear	Burr inspection schedule; metal detection or magnets downstream
Packing	Foreign bodies, wrong label, wrong allergen information	Clean area, glass and hard plastics policy, label check at the start of each run, metal detection if fitted
Storage and dispatch	Damage, pests	Sealed packs, clean racking, delivery vehicle condition

Acrylamide

Acrylamide forms naturally when foods such as coffee are roasted. Commission Regulation (EU) 2017/2158, retained in UK law, requires food business operators that roast coffee to apply mitigation measures and sets a benchmark level for roasted coffee of 400 micrograms per kilogram. The benchmark is a performance indicator, not a legal maximum. Note in your plan that you have considered acrylamide, that you roast to consistent, recorded profiles, and how you would respond if testing showed results above the benchmark. The Food Standards Agency publishes guidance for businesses.

Mycotoxins

Ochratoxin A (OTA) is produced by moulds that can grow on coffee that was badly dried or stored. In Great Britain, maximum levels are set in assimilated Regulation (EC) No 1881/2006: 5.0 micrograms per kilogram for roasted coffee beans and ground roasted coffee, and 10.0 for soluble coffee. Northern Ireland follows the newer EU regulation with lower levels. Your control is buying from reputable suppliers, rejecting damp or mouldy lots and storing green coffee dry. See storing green coffee.

Allergens

Plain coffee contains none of the 14 regulated allergens. Flavored coffees, coffee blended with nuts or chocolate, and products packed on shared lines can. If you handle allergenic ingredients, your plan must cover segregation, cleaning between runs and labeling. See allergens for coffee roasters.

Keep it proportionate

A small roastery's plan can be a few pages: the flow diagram, the hazard table, one or two CCPs with their checks, and record sheets for receiving, cleaning, pest control, CCP checks and training. The test is whether it reflects what you actually do. An inspector would rather see a short plan with complete records than a template with blank logs.

Where Roastnet helps

Questions roasters ask

Do coffee roasters need a HACCP plan?: UK food businesses must have a food safety management system based on HACCP principles, proportionate to their size. For a roastery that is a short written plan with records.
What are the critical control points in coffee roasting?: Usually foreign body removal: destoning green coffee and, where fitted, metal detection or magnets on packed or ground product. Your own hazard analysis decides.
Is acrylamide a legal limit for coffee?: No. The 400 micrograms per kilogram for roasted coffee is a benchmark level used to judge whether mitigation is working, not a maximum level. Roasters must still apply mitigation measures.
Can I use Safer Food Better Business?: Safer Food Better Business packs are written for caterers and retailers. A roastery that manufactures and packs coffee usually needs a plan built around its own process, though the record sheets can be adapted.

Official sources

Rules change. These sources were checked on October 9, 2026; always confirm the current position with the body that publishes them before you act.