Export document
FDA facility registration
Any foreign facility that manufactures, processes, packs or holds food for consumption in the United States has to be registered with the FDA, with a US agent named. It renews on a cycle, and lapsed registration refuses food as reliably as no registration at all.
The essentials.
- The facility registers, not the exporter
- Registration attaches to the premises where the food is made, processed, packed or held. A trader cannot register on a producer's behalf.1
- A United States agent is required
- Foreign facilities name a US agent for communications, and the agent has to confirm the appointment.
- It expires
- Registration is renewed on a biennial cycle. A lapse is invisible until a shipment is refused, and it happens.
- It is separate from FSVP and prior notice
- Three different obligations on different parties. Registration is the producer's, FSVP and prior notice are the importer's.1
Who asks for it.
Only these markets require it. Shipping the same goods anywhere else, the question does not arise.
What it does not cover.
It is not an approval of the food
Registration means the facility told the FDA it exists and what it does. Nobody inspected anything. Buyers read it as a quality signal and it is an administrative one.
It does not cover your own obligations
A registered supplier does nothing for your foreign supplier verification programme, which examines how you verified them rather than whether they filed a form.
Lapses are the common failure
The producer registered once, the renewal cycle passed, and nobody noticed until a container was refused. Ask for the registration and the renewal date rather than the number alone.
Questions buyers ask.
Can I register the factory myself?
No. The facility registers, and it names a United States agent for communications. What a buyer can do is confirm the registration is current before ordering, which is a check almost nobody performs.
Does registration mean the FDA inspected them?
No. It is a notification that the facility exists and what it handles. FDA does inspect foreign facilities and registration is not that inspection, and buyers routinely read one as the other.
What if it lapsed?
The food is refused at entry, and the fix takes time you do not have with a container at a port. Ask for the renewal date as well as the number.
Where this comes up.
Indonesian coffee
Arabica and robusta origins, wet-hulling, how the national standard grades a lot, packing, and the documents a buyer needs including EUDR.
Indonesian vannamei shrimp
How farmed vannamei is counted, processed and shipped, and why the paperwork differs from wild-caught seafood: no catch certificate, but residues.
Indonesian virgin coconut oil
Three products get sold as coconut oil and only one is virgin. What the APCC standard defines, and how to tell them apart before you pay.
Indonesian pepper
Two named Indonesian origins, and the FAQ against ASTA distinction that decides what actually arrives in the bag. What a pepper contract has to name.
Indonesian coconut water
A beverage, so processing and packaging decide everything. What aseptic filling changes, and where nata de coco comes from.
What an American buyer has to build first
FSVP, the Lacey declaration and formaldehyde all sit on the importer rather than the producer. Six things, in order, before a first container.
Export documents, by category
Four categories, four different sets of paperwork and almost no overlap. Built from the reference pages, so it cannot fall behind what is published.
Sources
- 1Foreign Supplier Verification Programs for importers of food. US Food and Drug Administration. Checked 5 August 2026.
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