OH Consultant

Bakery & Food Manufacturing: WHS Management That Works When You're Not Looking

Flour dust has never had a formal workplace exposure standard in Australia. From 1 December 2026, it gets one: 0.5 mg/m³ inhalable. If you run a bakery or flour-handling operation and you have never measured airborne flour dust, you have eight months to find out whether your workers are overexposed to a substance that is now proven to cause occupational asthma.

0.5 mg/m³
Flour dust WEL (NEW)
Safe Work Australia WEL List, May 2025
Up to 10%
Bakery workers with occupational asthma
Safe Work Australia hazard profile — flour dust
9
Codes of Practice becoming binding
SafeWork NSW — Section 26A, commencing 1 July 2026

What keeps bakery and food manufacturing managers up at night

Flour dust exposure with no benchmark — until now

Australian bakeries have operated without a formal WES for flour dust. Many bakery operators have never commissioned exposure monitoring because there was no regulatory limit to measure against. From December 2026, flour dust gets an inhalable WEL of 0.5 mg/m³. Published literature shows that bakeries routinely exceed this level during mixing, weighing, and bag-tipping operations without engineering controls. A PCBU who has never measured flour dust exposure has no evidence that workers are protected — and occupational asthma caused by flour dust is well-documented, irreversible, and compensable.

Safe Work Australia WEL List (effective 1 December 2026); WHS Regulation 2025, Chapter 7

Manual handling injuries dominate the claims profile

Bakery work involves repetitive lifting of 25kg flour bags, dough handling, and loading ovens in awkward postures. Manual handling injuries account for the majority of workers' compensation claims in food manufacturing. The Hazardous Manual Tasks Code of Practice requires a systematic approach to identifying, assessing, and controlling manual task hazards — and from July 2026, that code becomes legally binding. A bakery that has not conducted formal manual task risk assessments for its key processes will be unable to demonstrate compliance.

Code of Practice — Hazardous manual tasks; WHS Act s.26A (commencing 1 July 2026)

Equipment guarding and lockout failures

Dough mixers, slicers, conveyor belts, and packaging machinery present nip points, entanglement hazards, and crush risks. The Managing the Risks of Plant Code requires formal risk assessment of every piece of plant, documented inspection schedules, and lockout/tagout procedures for maintenance. In food manufacturing, production pressure often leads to guards being removed or bypassed to clear blockages, and lockout procedures being skipped under time pressure.

Code of Practice — Managing the risks of plant in the workplace; WHS Regulation 2025, Chapter 5

What's changing for bakery and food manufacturing in 2026

WEL Impact (3 substances affected)

SubstanceCurrent WESNew WELChangeEffective
Flour dust (inhalable)No current WES0.5 mg/m³NEW1 December 2026
Grain dustN/A1.5 mg/m³Confirm controls1 December 2026

Section 26A Applicable Codes (9)

Managing risks of hazardous chemicals
Flour dust is a hazardous chemical requiring SDS, register, and risk assessment
Hazardous manual tasks
Dough handling, bag lifting, oven loading are high-risk manual tasks requiring formal assessment
Managing the risks of plant
Mixers, slicers, conveyors require documented risk assessment, guarding, and lockout/tagout procedures
Managing noise and preventing hearing loss
Industrial mixers, packaging lines generate noise levels that may exceed 85 dB(A)

Penalty Exposure

Max Individual
$447,122 (Category 2)
Max Body Corporate
$2,235,363 (Category 2)
Uninsurable Since
10 June 2020
Recent Prosecution
SafeWork SA fined a manufacturing business $840,000 after an apprentice death in November 2024 — the highest single fine in SA's WHS history, demonstrating the trajectory of penalties across jurisdictions.

How EHS Atlas solves this for bakery and food manufacturing

FlaskConical
Flour dust flagged before December 2026
System registers flour dust with the incoming WEL of 0.5 mg/m³, flags it as a NEW substance with no prior WES, and prompts exposure monitoring.
Your chemical register shows flour dust as red — no prior monitoring, new WEL, action required.
ShieldAlert
Manual tasks, plant, and chemical risks in one system
Structured assessments for flour handling, dough processing, and cleaning chemicals. Each maps to relevant code and regulation.
Risk assessment for 25kg flour bag handling links to Hazardous Manual Tasks Code — the code becoming binding in July 2026.
GraduationCap
Track food safety and WHS training together
Manage induction, manual handling training, lockout/tagout competency, and chemical handling for every worker.
New baker starts. System flags: manual handling training, flour dust awareness, and mixer lockout procedure needed before first shift.
ClipboardCheck
Equipment guards, LEV, and housekeeping inspections
Scheduled inspections for mixer guards, dust extraction, and general housekeeping with photo evidence.
Weekly mixer guard inspection finds guard removed. Corrective action assigned. Production paused until guard reinstated.
AlertTriangle
Track injuries, near-misses, and occupational illness reports
When a worker reports respiratory symptoms, the system links to flour dust exposure records and health monitoring obligations.
Baker reports persistent cough. System prompts review of flour dust exposure and health monitoring schedule.
BarChart3
Countdown to December 2026 for flour dust
Shows flour dust as NEW with no prior standard — highest priority for action.
Dashboard: flour dust = red (NEW), grain dust = amber (review). 240 days to deadline.

Your bakery and food manufacturing compliance calendar

January
Annual plant risk assessment review — mixers, slicers, conveyors
Code of Practice — Managing risks of plant
Unguarded machinery = prohibition notice
March
Manual handling risk assessment update
Code of Practice — Hazardous manual tasks
Highest claims category in food manufacturing
May
Commission flour dust exposure monitoring (before December 2026 deadline)
Safe Work Australia WEL List
Cannot demonstrate compliance without baseline data
July
Section 26A takes effect — verify 9 codes documented
WHS Act s.26A
Legally binding from 1 July 2026
September
Review ventilation and dust extraction effectiveness
WHS Regulation 2025, Chapter 7
Engineering controls are higher-order than PPE
December
WEL takes effect — flour dust 0.5 mg/m³ is now the legal limit
WHS Regulation 2025 (as amended)
Immediate enforcement

See EHS Atlas configured for bakery and food manufacturing

Pre-loaded with flour dust and grain dust data, manual handling assessment templates, and your 9 applicable Codes of Practice.