Keeping a North Norfolk pub's credit-crunch barter system credible

A North Norfolk village pub is working with North Norfolk District Council to offer a credit-crunch-beating system of trading produce for pints that is safe and legal.

The Pigs at Edgefield, near Holt, is offering to barter pints for locally-sourced food that customers bring in to be cooked in the pub kitchens.

NNDC Environmental Health Officer Ian Hogg said: "It's a great idea that could really help people who are feeling a pinch in their pockets, as well as being a good selling point for the pub. There are laws that govern the sourcing and sale of food, though, so we need to look carefully at how the Pigs can make sure what it's doing is safe for its customers and within the law."

Environmental Health legislation [The Food Hygiene (England) Regulations 2006 and Regulation (EC) 852/2004] says that food businesses must have a system for ensuring what they serve to customers is safe to eat. This legislation is in place, among other reasons, to combat a black market trade in substandard or unsafe meat and produce.

Mr Hogg explained: "There's a world of difference between being offered game that is surplus after a properly-organised shoot, for example, and being given half a deer that could quite possibly be roadkill. It's not just meat that food businesses need to know about. If they're offered a box of vegetables, they need to know that any chemicals used on them have been used properly, or that they are not diseased."

Mr Hogg continued: "The Pigs has been confident about what it has been given until now, because it has come from a few trusted local sources, but as word spreads they could have problems with people who are less scrupulous about the quality of food that they want to swap for beer - food that could have come from anywhere.

"It would be a huge shame if this great idea was scuppered because customers can't trust that what they're being served is of a good quality, and safe to eat."

It might be possible for the business to carry out a few simple checks to reassure itself about the quality of what it is offered - and to help decide what it should turn down, if necessary.

"Food businesses already have to have a food safety management system, so this isn't anything new," said Mr Hogg. "We don't want to strangle this barter system with red tape, and I hope we can simply work within the existing law and develop a common-sense system that means the Pigs learns everything they need to know about the food they bring into their kitchens. We're here to help the Pigs make their idea work, and I'm really grateful that they've welcomed that help."

Tim Abbott, head chef at the Pigs, said: "It's great to be working with the council, as opposed to working against them, to make a great idea work for all parties, as it all makes sense to use up fresh local surplus foodstuffs!"

ENDS