The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) will on Tuesday hold meetings with distribution industry representatives about how to keep household goods moving to and from supermarkets if the UK crashes out of the EU next month.

If the UK leaves the EU without a deal the overwhelming majority of wooden pallets, used to transport a vast range of consumer goods from breakfast cereal to pet food, beer and chocolate, will not meet strict EU rules designed to stop the spread of bark beetles and other pests.

If the pallets are prevented from transiting between the UK and the 27-country bloc, the millions of tonnes of goods they carry will not be able to be transported which could potentially lead to food shortages. More than 3m pallets move between the UK and EU every month.

The UK government has told distributors that all timber packaging, including pallets, destined for the EU countries after a no-deal Brexit must be heat-treated or fumigated to comply with International Standards For Phytosanitary (Regarding Plants) Measures 15 (ISPM 15). At present pallets moving between EU member states, including the UK, are exempt from the ISPM 15 standard. Industry experts said fewer than a third of the pallets used for EU-UK trade comply with the standard.