In Branded Garden Products v HMRC [2017] UKFTT 86 (16 January 2017) the FTT found that edible flowers were not food for the purpose of zero-rating under VATA 1994 Sch 8 group 1.
Branded Garden Products (BGP) sells packeted seeds plants gifts and related horticultural products. It appealed against HMRC’s refusal to zero-rate its supplies of certain plants and seeds for plants that produce edible flowers. Notice 701/38 (on seeds and plants) contains an exhaustive list of flower seed varieties which can be zero-rated on the basis that they produce flowers for human consumption provided that they are ‘held out’ as such. However BGP’s products were not on the list.
The FTT observed: ‘We will not seek to prescribe exactly what the ordinary man in the street would regard as “food” since that is a multifactorial assessment that will depend largely...
