Claiming 'Organic' in a Restaurant or Shop in France: What the Rules Require

On a product label, the rule is well known: no “organic” without a certificate. But in a dining room or on a shop shelf, things get more complicated: EU regulation 2018/848 excludes catering from its scope, France has created a national specification for restaurants, the EGalim law sets quotas for canteens, and shops navigate between certification and exemptions. Here is the full map for displaying “bio” without risk, depending on your business.

Commercial catering: a national specification

Restaurants, caterers and food counters that want to promote organic food fall under a French homologated specification, applicable since 1 January 2020 and inspected by the approved certification bodies. The principle: to claim organic — an ingredient, a dish, or an establishment-level positioning — you must notify your activity and submit to inspection by a certification body.

The scheme notably provides for establishment-level display by categories, based on the share of organic purchases (by value): 50 to 75%, 75 to 95%, and over 95% organic food. A restaurant can also certify only specific ingredients or dishes, provided its communication stays strictly limited to what is inspected. What the auditor checks resembles what they check at a processor: supplier invoices and certificates, consistency between volumes purchased and served, compliant displays and menus.

Beware of the “let’s just put a logo on the chalkboard” reflex: an uninspected organic claim in catering is treated as a misleading commercial practice, just as it would be on a packaged product.

Collective catering: the EGalim logic

Canteens — schools, companies, hospitals — are outside the scope of the EU regulation, and the commercial-catering specification does not target them either. Their framework is the EGalim law: since 1 January 2022, meals served in collective catering must include at least 50% sustainable and quality products, including 20% products from organic farming (by purchase value).

The practical consequence: the canteen is not certified, but its suppliers must be. Public and private buyers therefore demand their suppliers’ valid organic certificates — a structural market for certified operators, all the more so as the shares actually achieved remain below the legal targets in much of collective catering. For a producer or processor, being certified and able to prove it (up-to-date certificate, Agence Bio public directory) has become a direct commercial argument with this market.

Shops: certification or exemption, depending on what you sell

For distribution, the regulation provides targeted exemptions — covered in more depth in our article on who needs organic certification:

What the shop does	Regime
Resale of pre-packaged organic products to the final consumer, stored on site	Exempt from certification
Loose (bulk) organic sales under the annual thresholds (in the region of €10,000 to €20,000 excluding VAT depending on the situation)	Exemption possible, to be validated
Bulk sales above the thresholds, repackaging, cutting, processing (deli counter, fresh-pressed juices…)	Certification required
Direct import of organic products	Certification required

Two reflexes for retailers: notify your activity to the Agence Bio even when exempt, and have your exact situation validated by a certification body before installing any “bio” signage in the shop. Moving from pre-packaged to bulk, or adding a deli counter, is enough to switch regimes.

Why these rules keep tightening: demand follows health and trust

These frameworks — the catering specification, EGalim quotas, narrow exemptions — accompany a demand that has structured itself around expectations of health and transparency. The review by Mie and colleagues published in 2017 in Environmental Health (“Human health implications of organic food and organic agriculture: a comprehensive review”), produced for the European Parliament, documents in particular the lower pesticide-residue exposure associated with organic diets and the value of controlled supply chains (see the study). It is that expectation of guarantee which makes uninspected claims so risky: the customer paying a premium for organic expects proof, not ambiance.

The logic is the same as in the rest of the food industry, where professional buyers demand food-safety certifications such as ISO 22000 before listing anything: in trust-based supply chains, claims without certificates no longer fly.

Where to start, depending on your case

• Restaurant or caterer: estimate your share of organic purchases by value, choose the level of claim (ingredients, dishes or establishment), notify your activity and request quotes from the certification bodies that inspect commercial catering.
• Canteen or collective-catering manager: organise purchase tracking to evidence the EGalim 50% / 20% targets, and systematise the collection of supplier certificates.
• Shop: qualify each flow (pre-packaged, bulk, processing) against the exemptions, notify, and certify what must be certified.

Take action

Catering and retail are the links in the chain where the gap between “displaying organic” and “being compliant” costs the most. To understand the whole system — the EU regulation, notification, certification bodies, annual inspections —, see our full guide to organic certification in France, with its free downloadable ebook.