Who is EHEDG?

The European Hygienic Engineering and Design Group (EHEDG) was founded in 1989 as a non-profit consortium of equipment manufacturers, food producers, suppliers to the food industry, research institutes and universities, public health authorities and governmental organisations. 

The principal goal of EHEDG is the promotion of safe food by improving hygienic engineering and design in all aspects of food manufacture.

EHEDG actively supports European legislation, which requires that handling, preparation processing and packaging of food is done hygienically using hygienic machinery and in hygienic premises according to the food hygiene directive, the machinery directive and the food contact materials directive (see EC Directive 2006/42/EC for Machinery, EN 1672-2 and EN ISO 14159 on Hygiene requirements for the design of machinery).

Equipment manufacturers and users are responsible to implement these requirements and EHEDG provides them guidance on the essential hygienic design standards in compliance with national and international legislation.

The EHEDG mission is defined as: "EHEDG enables safe food production by providing guidance as an authority on hygienic engineering and design"​.

Find out more about EHEDG here

EHEDG (NZ Regional Section) offers a range of Hygienic Design Courses run in conjunction with NZIFST.

Who should attend an EHEDG Course?

• Designers from Technical Engineering, Process Development and Quality Assurance
  • After completion of the EHEDG Advanced Course on Hygienic Design, the qualified participant should be able to successfully discharge the role of sole responsible expert in hygienic design for design, construction or operational teams involved with food machinery or food processing.
• Management, Marketing and Sales Staff from Design & Mechanical Engineering Companies and Food Manufacturers 
  • Sales and marketing professionals need to have sufficient knowledge of hygienic design to assure compliance with the above requirements. After completion of the EHEDG Advanced Course on Hygienic Design, the qualified participant should be able to successfully discharge the role of executive manager or marketing or sales professional in an organisation involved in designing, installing, maintaining, operating and cleaning food machinery or food processes and systems (in such a way that hygienic safety is established and maintained).
• Operators, Maintenance and Reliability Engineers, Installers and Sanitarians
  • After completion of the EHEDG Advanced Course on Hygienic Design, the qualified participant should be competent to operate, maintain, install, clean or identify areas of concern with food machinery or processes in such a way that its hygienic safety is established and maintained, provided the general training is complete.
• Auditors, Inspectors, Testers, Consultants and Certifiers
  • After completion of the EHEDG Advanced Course on Hygienic Design, the qualified participant should be competent to verify or test the conformance of hygienic equipment and associated systems and documentation to recognised standards, including EHEDG Document 8.

EHEDG Advanced Hygienic Design Course (AHDC) Costs for 2025