Research object is the labor potential of food industry enterprises. In the article researched branch specifics and justified approaches to forming the labor potential of food industry enterprises. The main problems for labor potential forming in modern conditions development of economic relations have been researched. The essence of the enterprise's labor potential and the main directions of its formation are determined by summarizing scientific research results. Enterprise labor potential is a systematic set of human resources, their competencies, opportunities and conditions for the realization of their labor abilities, which are available or can be mobilized in the nearest future to achieve business entity goals. It has been proven that the process labor potential forming of food industry enterprises should take place in its components context: labor resources, their competencies, opportunities and conditions for the implementation of labor activity. The key provisions regarding to use a resource and competence approach labor potential formation of the enterprise are proposed. The process of forming the competences of enterprises and their personnel has a strategic nature, since it can be implemented only in the long term with the use of strategic management tools. Modern trends in character changing for participation in economic processes of engineering and technological workers and specialists in the economic profile are characterized. The need to identify and implement external opportunities and create internal conditions based on them to realize business entity labor potential is substantiated.The sectoral features labor potential formation in the food industry are determined, taking into account the need for the social responsibility development for personnel and enterprises placement factors. It was researched how the processes of labor potential formation affect the main performance parameters of food industry enterprises.So, the determining role labor potential in providing the effectiveness functioning of food industry enterprises has been proven and the main approaches for its formation have been substantiated, considering the opportunities and limitations that exist in modern conditions.