# Importing Sri Lankan Groceries into the US: What Clears Easily and What Does Not Source: https://srilankaexport.com/fr/sri-lankan-grocery-products-us-import-rules/ If you run a Sri Lankan or South Indian grocery in the United States, you already know which shelves empty first and which brands you cannot get for weeks. What decides whether a product can be brought in reliably is less often the brand and more often the category it sits in. Some Sri Lankan groceries clear US import with ordinary paperwork. Others need extra filings that many factories have never made. This guide sorts them. ### The short version - You, the store, are the importer, so FDA prior notice and FSVP are yours. - Every factory needs a current FDA registration, and 2026 renewals close on 31 December. - Start with dry goods. Jars, cans, fish and frozen need extra filings or handling. - Most Sri Lankan packs fail on the label, not the food. Ask for the export pack. One standing caveat. This is a plain-English summary of US rules as we understand them, not legal advice, and the FDA and US Customs change their requirements. Your customs broker has the final word on any shipment. What we can speak for is the Sri Lankan side: what a factory can and cannot put in your hands. ### The importer is you, and that decides a lot Whoever brings food into the United States is the importer, and several obligations attach to that role, not to the supplier. The two that matter most for a grocery store: - Prior notice. Every food shipment has to be notified to the FDA before it arrives. Your customs broker normally files it. - FSVP (the Foreign Supplier Verification Program). The importer has to verify that each foreign food supplier makes its food safely. In practice that means holding documents from the factory: its FDA registration, what hazards it controls and how. A factory you have never dealt with, reached through a middleman, rarely sends these. Two things follow. The factory must hold a current FDA food facility registration. Registrations are renewed every two years, between 1 October and 31 December of each even-numbered year, and 2026 is a renewal year, so a registration that is not renewed by the end of December lapses. And you want to buy from someone who can get the factory’s documents, which usually means buying from the factory or its own export arm. ### Three tiers of Sri Lankan groceries Tier 1Ordinary paperwork Products: biscuits, crackers, dry snacks, rice, rice flour, string hopper and roti flour, curry powders and spice blends, tea, noodles, kithul treacle and jaggery. What it takes: factory FDA registration, US-format labels, prior notice, and the importer’s FSVP file. Tier 2Extra process filings Products: sambols, pickles, chutneys and pastes in jars, sauces, canned fish, some canned vegetables, coconut milk in cans. What it takes: everything in tier 1, plus the factory must have filed its process with the FDA as an acidified or low-acid canned food (the FCE and SID filings). Many small factories have not. Tier 3Specialist handling Products: frozen foods, dried fish and Maldive fish. What it takes: frozen needs a refrigerated container and an unbroken cold chain. Fish falls under the FDA seafood safety rules, which need a HACCP plan at the processor and extra checks by the importer. The first tier is where a new supply line should start. A shipment that is all first-tier goods is the one least likely to be held. ### Labels: where most Sri Lankan packs fail A pack made for a Sri Lankan supermarket is usually not legal on a US shelf, even when the food inside is identical. A US label needs: - A US-format Nutrition Facts panel - An ingredient list in English, in descending order by weight - The major allergens declared, including sesame, which was added to the list in 2023 - Net quantity in both US and metric units - The name and address of the manufacturer, packer or distributor - The country of origin, for US Customs Many Sri Lankan factories make a separate export pack for exactly this reason. Ask for it by name. If a supplier offers you goods from a local wholesaler’s shelf, they are domestic packs, and relabeling them properly is a job in itself. Watch the colors. Sweets, cordials, jellies and some snacks use food colors. A color permitted in Sri Lanka is not always permitted in the United States, and a non-permitted color is a common reason for a detention. Check the ingredient list of anything brightly colored before you order it. ### Five questions to ask any supplier - Is this factory registered with the FDA, and what is the registration number? - Do you have a US-labeled export pack for this product? Can I see a photo of the label? - For anything in a jar or can: has the process been filed with the FDA? - How many months of shelf life will the goods have when they are handed over? - Will you let an independent inspector check the goods before they ship? A supplier who answers all five without hesitating has done this before. A supplier who cannot answer the first one should not be shipping to you yet. ### Mixed loads A single store rarely needs a full container of one brand. The usual answer is a mixed load: several brands from several factories, consolidated in Colombo and shipped together. It works, but it multiplies the paperwork: every factory in the load needs its own registration and labels, and one non-compliant product can hold up the whole shipment. Keep the first mixed load to first-tier products from factories that have answered the five questions. #### Supplying Sri Lankan grocery stores abroad We buy from Sri Lankan factories and sell to stores in one mixed shipment on one invoice, and every factory is paid only after an independent inspection. [How grocery wholesale works](/grocery-wholesale/) Grocery buyers: [Grocery wholesale](/grocery-wholesale/) · [Getting Sri Lankan products into grocery stores](/sri-lankan-products-into-grocery-stores/)