IrishMetro Restaurant Newsletters are published monthly in order to keep you updated and fully informed about important headlines which you will find very useful in the day to day running of your business. The focus is to assist food businesses to achieve up to date standards and comply with the law:

Learn More about Irish and EU legislation on Food Safety.

How Food Safety Laws are enforced in Ireland.

How the EU Food Inspection works.

Find answers to Frequently Asked Questions.

Number of restaurants that have shut down in your area.

Number of restaurants issued with Enforcement Orders.
For example, did you know that:

1. In 2024, many Irish restaurants faced closures due to a combination of rising costs, including energy, food, and labor, and challenges like labor availability and changes in customer behavior?

2. The Restaurants Association of Ireland (RAI) reported an average of two restaurants closing each day in 2024, with over 70 closures in February alone.

Reasons for Closures:

Rising Costs: Restaurants faced significant increases in food, energy, labor, and interest rates, making it difficult to operate profitably.
Labor Shortages: The difficulty in finding and retaining qualified staff contributed to closures.

Changes in Customer Behavior: Shift in customer preferences, including a move towards more home-based dining, also impacted restaurant businesses.

Government Policies: Measures implemented by the government, such as VAT changes, further burdened restaurant businesses.
Food Safety Issues: Some restaurants were closed due to breaches of food safety regulations.

3. According to Hospitality Ireland, In the first three months of 2025, new figures show that 150 restaurants, cafes, gastropubs and food businesses shut their doors for good.

4. And according to the data released by the Food Safety Authority Of Ireland (FSAI)-- 133 Enforcement Orders were served on food businesses for breaches of food safety legislation in 2024, an increase of 45% on the 92 that were served in 2023.

The FSAI outlined the importance of robust food safety management systems and stressed that the legal responsibility lies with food businesses to ensure that they appropriately train staff to produce, serve and sell food that is safe to eat, and ensure that their premises are clean and adequately pest proofed.

Between 1 January and 31 December 2024, 115 Closure Orders, 16 Prohibition Orders and 2 Improvement Orders were issued by Environmental Health Officers in the Health Service Executive, sea-fisheries protection officers in the Sea-Fisheries Protection Authority and inspectors in the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine on food businesses throughout the country.

A number of recurring food safety issues identified in food businesses resulted in Enforcement Orders being issued, including a lack of pest control procedures inadequate regular and thorough cleaning failure to maintain correct temperatures of foodstuffs unsuitable food storage facilities and inadequate staff training in relation to food safety and hygiene.

-- Ten Enforcement Orders were served on food businesses during the month of April for breaches of food safety legislation, pursuant to the FSAI Act, 1998 and the European Union (Official Controls in Relation to Food Legislation) Regulations, 2020.

The Enforcement Orders were issued by Environmental Health Officers in the Health Service Executive (HSE). Two Closure Orders were served under the FSAI Act, 1998 on:

Greenville Deli (Restaurant/Café), 45 Monkstown Avenue, Monkstown, Co. Dublin. Sirmone Limited T/A Soul Bakery and TPB, Unit L5, Ballymount Industrial Estate, Dublin.

12 Six Closure Orders were served under the European Union (Official Controls in Relation to Food Legislation) Regulations, 2020:

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