What Thailand Requires of Canadian Food, by Category

Thailand has no single answer to "what do I need". The certificate, the attestations and the pre-export approvals are set per product category, and the categories do not behave alike: one is closed, one turns on a letter the Thai FDA wrote to Canada last September, and one needs a certificate signed by a veterinarian.

Everything below is read from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency's export requirements for Thailand, five pages, one per category, each with its own last-modified date. What it does not give you is the Thai FDA's own product registration procedure.

That agency's food division site answers an "Access Violation" interstitial to requests from our network; one request in dozens returned the site's navigation and nothing else. We have not read the procedure, so we do not describe it.

The licence you do not hold

Across every category, the Thai importer must first obtain an import licence issued by the Thai FDA before importing food for sale in Thailand. The application requires the importer to submit documentation including business registration and approval of the importing establishment through inspection. You cannot hold it, and a buyer who does not have it is not a buyer yet.

An import permit may also be required per shipment. CFIA states that it does not have a list of which food product types require one before export from Canada, and recommends verifying with the Thai importer. Read that as an absence rather than a reticence: Canada does not hold such a list.

Milk and dairy

Canada is authorised to export dairy products. Already exported: milk, cream, evaporated milk, skim and whole milk powder, whey products, cheese including cheddar and specialty and fresh cheeses, dairy-based edible ice, and others such as lactose, milk albumin and buttermilk products.

There is no approved-establishment list for Thailand, and no product registration information the CFIA holds. What stands in their place is an oversight condition: the manufacturing has to be under official CFIA oversight, in an establishment licensed under the Safe Food for Canadians Regulations.

Two documents travel. A manufacturer's declaration signed by an authorised person of the establishment, with the products identified so they match the shipment exactly. And health certificate CFIA/ACIA 5813, carrying animal health and public health requirements, signed by the CFIA official veterinarian and official inspector.

Product for the Thai market is also subject to pasteurisation, or control measures of equivalent performance, per the World Organisation for Animal Health recommendations or the Codex code of hygienic practice for milk and milk products. Halal certification may be required; CFIA states it is not involved in providing it.

Fish and seafood

All fish and seafood products are eligible, on a Certificate of Origin and Hygiene, CFIA/ACIA 5003.

This is where Thailand publishes hard numbers, and they are what your lab report has to clear. Maximum permitted levels in parts per million: mercury 0.5, inorganic arsenic 2.0, copper 20, lead 1.0, tin 250 and, for canned products, tin 100. Then a pesticide run on a fresh weight basis: aldrin 0.1, BHC 0.5, DDT 5.0, dieldrin 0.3, endrin 0.3, heptachlor and heptachlor epoxide 0.3, lindane 0.5, malathion 0.6, parathion 0.2.

Canned fish and seafood must also be labelled and marked in the Thai language showing the product common name, the establishment registration number, the manufacturer's name and address, the date of manufacturing, the net weight and any additives used. That establishment number is a Thai-side number, so the can cannot be finished until the Thai registration exists.

Note the date. This page was last modified on 4 March 2024, older than the other four, so treat the limits as the position Canada records and have your importer check the current Thai notification.

Meat and poultry

Read the first line before anything else: CFIA states that Canada does not currently have market access for beef and pork to Thailand.

The rest describes the framework that would apply, which is a different thing from open. Eligible products are listed as beef from boneless skeletal muscle of animals under thirty months at slaughter, and pork meat, meat products and offal.

Boneless beef is subject to inspection and detention for laboratory testing on arrival at the owner's or importer's expense, and failure to follow the import procedures may result in the meat being returned or destroyed without compensation. The transport container must be cleaned and disinfected immediately prior to loading.

The certificate is CFIA/ACIA 1454, with Annex A for beef and Annex B for pork, each requiring a prescribed anthrax attestation in the additional certification section. Carton marking is covered on the Thai marking page on this site.

Maple syrup and processed products

All processed products must be manufactured or processed in establishments licensed under the Safe Food for Canadians Regulations with the licence activity "Preparing food for export". That is a specific activity on the licence, worth checking against what your plant actually holds. The certificate for maple syrup is a Certificate of Free Sale, CFIA/ACIA 5786.

CFIA records no product specifications and puts grade, labelling, packaging and marking on the exporter to meet as Thailand requires.

Fresh fruit and vegetables, and the CanadaGAP letter

Eligibility is species by species, based on a pest risk assessment carried out by Thailand and the phytosanitary requirements that follow. A species that has not been through that assessment has no route, so CFIA directs exporters to their local Plant Health office well in advance.

Shipments must comply with two Thai instruments: Notification of the Ministry of Public Health No. 386 B.E. 2560 (2017), on production process, equipment and utensils for producing and storing some fresh fruits or vegetables and on labelling, and Notification No. 420 B.E. 2563 (2020), on food production processes, equipment and storage practices.

Then the useful part. CFIA records that in a letter dated 23 September 2025, Thailand's Food and Drug Administration confirmed that the food safety requirements of both notifications may be met by CanadaGAP certification in Canada. That converts a compliance problem written in Thai into a certification a Canadian grower can already hold.

Without CanadaGAP, CFIA notes another certification programme may serve and recommends confirming with the importer first.

The certificate, in one place

Dairy: CFIA/ACIA 5813, plus a manufacturer's declaration. Fish and seafood: CFIA/ACIA 5003. Meat: CFIA/ACIA 1454, Annex A for beef, Annex B for pork. Maple syrup: CFIA/ACIA 5786.

Two constraints apply whatever the category. A certificate of origin may be requested at the border inspection posts, and it is issued by chambers of commerce, not by CFIA. And export certificates cannot be issued for products that have already left Canada, which makes the certificate a pre-shipment item rather than something you chase afterwards.

The order to do this in

Confirm the category and its certificate, because the rest follows from that, not from the product's commercial description. In meat, settle market access before commercial work. In processed products, check the licence activity. Get your importer to confirm their import licence and whether the shipment needs a permit, in writing, before you price the deal.

And in fresh produce, settle the CanadaGAP position first: it is the one piece of Thai compliance you can complete entirely inside Canada.