Many Czech food buyers still take farm deliveries on spoken deals. One was fined 1,040,000 CZK, and by 2028 farm deliveries need a written contract.

The competition office looked at 488 food buyers and found spoken orders still common, and fruit collection points buying with no contract at all.uohs.gov.czCompetition office — sector inquiry into the food chain, final report (another site)The office examined 488 buyers of farm and food products across 19 sectors and read 4,058 contracts, orders and invoices: spoken contracts are still common in the lower links of the chain, 13 of the 59 meat buyers were working with no written contract before deliveries, fruit collection points mostly buy with no…Complaint · From 19 August 2028 every farm delivery needs a written contract agreed first.EUR-Lexeur-lex.europa.euRegulation (EU) 2026/1739 — written contracts in the farm and food chain (another site)The EU law that rewrites Article 168 of the farm-market regulation: from 19 August 2028 a delivery of farm produce by a farmer, a farmers' association or a producer organisation to a processor, distributor or retailer must be covered by a written contract agreed before delivery, with a price or a price formula,…In the source’s words“by farmers, including farmers’ associations, or by producer organisations or associations of producer organisations, to processors, distributors or retailers, shall be covered by a written contract between the relevant parties.”Regulation ·

Good for Someone who knows how grain and produce are bought and can sell to traders.

Category
Legal
Entry
Moderate
Verified

The opportunity

2/2 · Clear, recurring pain

Czech buyers of farm produce will need a written contract with each farmer before the goods move, and many have none today.2 sourcesEUR-Lexeur-lex.europa.euRegulation (EU) 2026/1739 — written contracts in the farm and food chain (another site)The EU law that rewrites Article 168 of the farm-market regulation: from 19 August 2028 a delivery of farm produce by a farmer, a farmers' association or a producer organisation to a processor, distributor or…In the source’s words“by farmers, including farmers’ associations, or by producer organisations or associations of producer organisations, to processors, distributors or…”Regulation · uohs.gov.czCompetition office — sector inquiry into the food chain, final report (another site)The office examined 488 buyers of farm and food products across 19 sectors and read 4,058 contracts, orders and invoices: spoken contracts are still common in the lower links of the chain, 13 of the 59 meat…Complaint ·

  • 13 of 59 meat buyers checked had no written contract before deliveries.uohs.gov.czCompetition office — sector inquiry into the food chain, final report (another site)The office examined 488 buyers of farm and food products across 19 sectors and read 4,058 contracts, orders and invoices: spoken contracts are still common in the lower links of the chain, 13 of the 59 meat buyers were working with no written contract before deliveries, fruit collection points mostly buy with no…Complaint ·
  • Fruit collection points mostly buy with no prior contract at all.uohs.gov.czCompetition office — sector inquiry into the food chain, final report (another site)The office examined 488 buyers of farm and food products across 19 sectors and read 4,058 contracts, orders and invoices: spoken contracts are still common in the lower links of the chain, 13 of the 59 meat buyers were working with no written contract before deliveries, fruit collection points mostly buy with no…Complaint ·
  • Grape orders are still largely placed by word of mouth.uohs.gov.czCompetition office — sector inquiry into the food chain, final report (another site)The office examined 488 buyers of farm and food products across 19 sectors and read 4,058 contracts, orders and invoices: spoken contracts are still common in the lower links of the chain, 13 of the 59 meat buyers were working with no written contract before deliveries, fruit collection points mostly buy with no…Complaint ·

Suggested solution

Build software inside a produce buyer's own trading and weighing system that writes each delivery contract with the price rule the law wants, sends it for electronic signature before the load moves and files it, as 3 companies already do in 2 other countries.

Why now

1/3 · Soft deadline

From 19 August 2028 a buyer that takes a delivery without a written contract is breaking directly applicable EU law.EUR-Lexeur-lex.europa.euRegulation (EU) 2026/1739 — written contracts in the farm and food chain (another site)The EU law that rewrites Article 168 of the farm-market regulation: from 19 August 2028 a delivery of farm produce by a farmer, a farmers' association or a producer organisation to a processor, distributor or retailer must be covered by a written contract agreed before delivery, with a price or a price formula,…In the source’s words“by farmers, including farmers’ associations, or by producer organisations or associations of producer organisations, to processors, distributors or retailers, shall be covered by a written contract between the relevant parties.”Regulation ·

  • A buyer was fined 1,040,000 CZK in 2025 for deliveries with no contract.uohs.gov.czCompetition office fines a farm cooperative 1,040,000 CZK (another site)The office fined a Czech farm cooperative for taking three deliveries of farm or food products from one supplier between February and May 2024 with no written contract concluded, and for paying four suppliers later than the law allows.News ·
  • Buyers say the duty is hard at small slaughterhouses taking phone offers.uohs.gov.czCompetition office — sector inquiry into the food chain, final report (another site)The office examined 488 buyers of farm and food products across 19 sectors and read 4,058 contracts, orders and invoices: spoken contracts are still common in the lower links of the chain, 13 of the 59 meat buyers were working with no written contract before deliveries, fruit collection points mostly buy with no…Complaint ·
  • Today's duty binds only large buyers, so smaller ones owe nothing yet.Zákony pro lidizakonyprolidi.czCzech act 395/2009 Sb. on significant market power in the food chain (another site)The Czech law that already requires a written contract, concluded before deliveries start, between a buyer with significant market power and its supplier of farm or food products — but only where the buyer is large enough against that supplier. The competition office supervises it and can fine up to 10,000,000 CZK or…Regulation ·

Willing to pay

0/2 · No sign yet

Nobody in Czechia is on record paying for this job, so it sits with the buyers' own staff and their lawyers.Market checkprosystem.czCzech check — who sells this here (another site)Czech-language web search, the state business register and our own funding ledger: no Czech seller writes, signs and files delivery contracts for farm produce. Farm software writes land leases, one trading back office tracks contracts for the buying firm, the contract-automation tools carry no farm templates, and one…Market check ·

  • No Czech seller publishes a price for writing, signing and filing these contracts.Market checkprosystem.czCzech check — who sells this here (another site)Czech-language web search, the state business register and our own funding ledger: no Czech seller writes, signs and files delivery contracts for farm produce. Farm software writes land leases, one trading back office tracks contracts for the buying firm, the contract-automation tools carry no farm templates, and one…Market check ·
  • Buyers carry it in-house, in their own terms and orders.2 sourcesuohs.gov.czCompetition office — sector inquiry into the food chain, final report (another site)The office examined 488 buyers of farm and food products across 19 sectors and read 4,058 contracts, orders and invoices: spoken contracts are still common in the lower links of the chain, 13 of the 59 meat…Complaint · mjm.czA commodity buyer's published purchase terms (another site)The 2024 purchase terms of a mid-size Czech crop buyer show how deliveries are papered today: the framework purchase contract is concluded with no price in it, and where it refers to the price list, the price…News ·
  • The other side of the bill is fines, one already 1,040,000 CZK.uohs.gov.czCompetition office fines a farm cooperative 1,040,000 CZK (another site)The office fined a Czech farm cooperative for taking three deliveries of farm or food products from one supplier between February and May 2024 with no written contract concluded, and for paying four suppliers later than the law allows.News ·

Validated abroad

2/3 · Proven once

In Spain and France, buyers of farm produce already buy software that writes the contract, signs it and files or fixes its price.2 sourcesdocuten.comDocuten (another site)A Spanish seller of the same job: contracts for food-chain deliveries written from templates carrying the fields the law requires, signed electronically, filed with the state food-contract register and kept…Company abroad · frenchweb.frPerfarmer (another site)A French seller of the buyer-side half: cooperatives and grain merchants publish their purchase prices in its app, the member farmer sells from the phone, and the contract is generated from that.Company abroad ·

Where it works: ES, FR — home market CZESFRCZ
  1. Docuten (another site)Based in Spain
  2. Perfarmer (another site)Based in France
  3. Asape (another site)Based in France

Market gap

2/2 · Open

No Czech seller writes, signs and files delivery contracts for farm produce; the nearest products handle land leases or the buying firm's back office.Market checkprosystem.czCzech check — who sells this here (another site)Czech-language web search, the state business register and our own funding ledger: no Czech seller writes, signs and files delivery contracts for farm produce. Farm software writes land leases, one trading back office tracks contracts for the buying firm, the contract-automation tools carry no farm templates, and one…Market check ·

New, selling this: nobody on file. Established, selling this: nobody on file. New, selling something nearby: nobody on file. Established, selling something nearby: Prosystem (since 1992), Geocentrum (since 1993), AG info (since 1994), Legito (since 2014), CleverFarm (since 2016). No established player sells this here.

The space is still open

Execution difficulty

2/3 · Moderate

Makes it easier

  • No licence is needed to sell this.
  • The buyers already run trading and weighing software it can sit in.
  • No Czech firm sells the contract side.

Makes it harder

  • The first customers are commodity traders and processors with their own systems.
  • The duty starts in 2028.

Suggested first moves

  1. Build a contract generator for one crop and one collection point, and give it to a mid-size grain buyer for the coming harvest.
  2. Call the purchasing managers at fruit and vegetable collection points.
  3. Sell the cooperative route as the second product.