Archives for June 30, 2014

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Health and safety comes before cost: 3M

By Nicholas Robinson

Supermarket price wars and cost-cutting should not interfere with food and drink businesses’ health and safety practices, products and services company 3M has warned.

Oak explosion in drinks

An innovation explosion in the alcoholic beverage sector across Europe, the US and Asia has led a flavour and fragrance company to develop a new liquid oak extract.

Ancient meets modern

A range of ancient gluten-free grains have been led into the 21st century by ingredients firm Glanbia Nutritionals (GN), to cash in on the growing free-from trend.

Europe's largest algae refinery opened

By Nicholas Robinson

Roquette has built a microalgae production unit at its Lestrem site near Calais in France, with the capability to produce 5,000t a year.

A sense for see-through bottles

A transparent-object sensor has been introduced, which is specifically designed for the food and beverage industry. It is said to offer better detection of objects such as glass bottles, polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles, transparent trays or...

FMEAs open for entries

By Rick Pendrous

Entries for the 2014 Food Manufacturing Excellence Awards close on July 31. Don’t miss your chance to be a star. Enter online at www.foodmanwards.co.uk

Spiral ovens give bacon that home-cooked appeal

Cooking bacon in a spiral convection oven provides advantages over more usual linear microwave ovens, creating products that look and taste like they were pan-fried, according to Unitherm Food Systems.

VSDs reduce duck freezing costs

One of the UK’s largest producers of duck products is set to save £30,000 a year on freezing costs following the introduction of ABB variable-speed drives (VSDs) on its blast chiller application.

Discounters' costs will increase as they grow

By Rick Pendrous

News that supermarket chain Sainsbury had entered into a £25M joint venture (jv) with Dansk Supermarked to establish 15 Netto stores across the UK was further evidence that the major multiples recognised they needed to do more to address the inexorable...

Inkjet printer adds date codes on flow wrap

Traditional Scottish craft baker JG Ross has installed a small character continuous inkjet coder for the application of date codes and batch information to pre-printed flow wrap for its new gluten-free manufacturing facility at Portsoy in Aberdeenshire

Morrisons' job losses unlikely to be last in sector

By Rick Pendrous

Bad news continues to dog supermarket chain Morrisons, with the announcement last month that 2,600 store managers were likely to lose their jobs as part of a review of its retail operations.

Acrylamide is a bigger cancer risk, says EFSA

By Nicholas Robinson

Acrylamide poses a bigger cancer risk to consumers – particularly children – than previously thought, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has warned.

Quick changes for FIR compliance

Coding specialist Interactive Coding Equipment (ICE) is offering kit which it claims will help food companies prepare for the new EU Food information for Consumers regulation (FIR), which comes into force on December 13.

Greggs ‘on front foot’ as strategy pays off

By Rod Addy

Greggs’s strategy is paying off, according to Sahill Shan, analyst at N+1 Singer, as the food-to-go chain disclosed strong half-year (H1) figures, ahead of interim results next month.

Control speed and quality in bagging

By Paul Gander

Vertical form-fill-seal (VFFS) for light product, whether crisps or salad, is one of those areas where line speed, handling and quality control have to be balanced against each other. In particular, how do you integrate metal detection without reducing...

Britain’s top private food and drink companies

By Nicholas Robinson

Brakes is Britain’s top private food and drink business, with annual sales of more than £3bn and profits of £140M, according to The Top Track 100 compiled by The Sunday Times.  

New marinating system for Dutch processor

Dutch food processor 2 Sisters Storteboom, a division of UK-based 2 Sisters Food Group, has installed a new ValueDrum marinating system from Marel at its Zeewolde plant.