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BASF innovates eco-friendly barriers for paper
Timing is everything
UK’s FSA issues new salt intake guidelines for kids
Bottled water leads to pollution problem
ConAgra poaches Nestlé boss
Whining power
Trade the real issue behind US GM complaint
Innovation needed to drive category sales
Fast takes
Harvard University researchers
reckon vitamin E may be good for more than stretch marks and rust.
They reckon it could also inhibit inflammation, aid the proliferation of
smooth muscle cells, and help the body to use vitamin A, essential for
health cells and good vision.
The US National Food Processors
Association (NFPA) has welcomed the US Department of Agriculture’s
decision to permit irradiated meat in school meals. European regulations
ban all but a few irradiated products.
The United Nations’ Food &
Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and World Health Organisation (WHO)
have called for the submission of data on the levels of acrylamide, a
cancer-causing agent, in foods and total diet. Details from http://www.acrylamide-food.org.
The White House is likely to
ask the USDA to come up with dietary guidelines that encourage people to
eat more fish and vegetables and to cut back on sweets and potato crisps.
The new guidelines, due in 2005, will have a massive impact on school
meals and food labels.
Packaging
BASF
innovates eco-friendly barriers for paper
A new approach to innovation has
helped German chemicals company BASF to ally with Sweden’s paper giant,
Stora Enso, to develop fully recyclable environmentally friendly barrier
coatings for paper packaging. BASF hopes it might replace waxed paper,
aluminium and plastic foil as the packaging medium of choice.
The 20 month project led to polymer
dispersions that protect packaged goods against water, moisture, oil and
grease. Application of the polymers forms part of existing production
processes. This gives higher production speeds and lower costs than other
barrier coating methods.
Since July 2001, BASF has set up
several new business development teams to promote new ideas with strong
innovative potential and, together with customers, to bring them to
market. All projects deploy a clearly defined business development
process. Dr Martin Brudermüller, head of BASF’s functional polymers
division, said “The success of the barrier dispersions project confirms
the importance of BASF's new concept of systematic innovation
management.”
The industry has been looking for
alternatives to the costly and complex composite packaging for almost 15
years, he said. Up to now, materials such as wax coatings, aluminium and
plastic foils have protected packaged goods. The barrier dispersion-coated
paper and board packaging is fully recyclable. “This technology shows
our dedication to this highly promising market of the future,” said
Wolfgang Hormuth, BASF's project manager.
NPD
Timing is everything
Ever wondered if those left-overs
are really safe to eat after a week in the fridge? Or if the packet at the
back of the fridge is past its use by date? Help is on the way in the form
of Timestrips. These are self-adhesive layered stickers that when
activated leak food grade coloured liquid at a predetermined rate into
special compartments to account for the passing of time.
The makers reckon Timestrips are
suitable for almost any product with a shelf life. This includes home
cooked food, prepared and frozen food, prepacked herbs and spices, deli
counter goods, as well as medicines, baby foods, breast milk, contact lens
solutions and even herbicides.
The makers are looking to
incorporate the labels into screw tops for bottles, Tupperware and jar
lids. They reckon this could prevent the UK from wasting 430 million
tonnes of goods that are wasted each year because they are not consumed by
due date.
Nutrition
UK’s FSA
issues new salt intake guidelines for kids
The British Food Standards Agency
has issued salt intake targets for children for the first time, and asked
foodservice firms and caterers to cut salt levels in their products.
The advice is based on a new report
by the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN). The FSA says
kids should have no more than 1 g/day between birth and six months, rising
to 6 g/day for teenagers.
The SACN reckons that cutting salt
consumption by one-third for adults, from around 9 g/day to 6 g/day, would
benefit public health by reducing average population blood pressure
levels. This would cut the risk of stroke and heart disease for the whole
UK population.
The British food industry has
already acted to cut average salt levels in processed foods.
Waste
Bottled
water leads to pollution problem
The staggering rise in consumption
of bottle water, especially in single-serve formats, is causing a waste
management problem, says the California Department of Conservation (CDOC).
It says more than one billion water
bottles a year wind up as California trash and landfill. That costs some
$26 million in unclaimed California Refund Value (CRV) deposits annually.
If recycled, the raw materials from those bottles could make 74 million
square feet of carpet, 74 million extra large T-shirts or 16 million
sweaters, among other things.
Which makes performance of the
controversial German deposit system for single trip containers worth
watching. CDOC reckons only 16% of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) water
bottles sold in California are recycled.
People
ConAgra
poaches Nestlé boss
ConAgra Foods says the former
president of Nestlé foodservice division Allan Lutz is to be president
and chief operating officer of its own foodservice operating group. The
company also promoted William Caskey to the new position of president of
foodservice sales.
Buying
habits
Whining
power
Don’t underestimate the strength
of the whine. US kids will directly control $10 billion in food and
beverage spending this year, and will influence four of five purchases in
this category, says a new report from Packaged Facts.
Expect more foods and drinks to
come with popular cartoons. “Character licensing has turned shopping
into a relationship building exercise for children,” said Packaged Facts
acquisitions editor Don Montuori.
GM
Trade the
real issue behind US GM complaint
The Bush Administration is trying
to use guilt over hunger and spurious legal challenges to lever open
market for US-grown genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Or so believes
the Washington Post.
In a long analysis of the US charge
that the European Union’s ban on new GMOs is illegal, the Post
concluded that “the dispute needs to be understood for what it is: a
multibillion-dollar cross-Atlantic battle over agricultural trade.”
The White House is under pressure
from farmers, the food industry and biotechnology companies to prise open
exports markets, even as local food processors worry that GM crops grown
for pharmaceuticals may wind up in the food chain.
The Post says the US has
planted nearly 100 million acres with GM crops, and that agriculture
officials claim farmers have lost at least $1 billion over the last five
years because they have been unable to export some biotechnology crops,
mainly corn, to Europe. However, GM soy products escaped as they were
approved before the ban.
Mary Kay Thatcher, director of
public policy at the American Farm Bureau Federation, said "We rely
on export markets for one-third of our crops; this is a nightmare."
Meanwhile, European consumers and
farmers alike appear to be resisting the introduction of GM crops and
foods, unless they are clearly labelled. Most are incensed at the Bush
plea to the World Trade Organisation to void the EU’s moratorium and
labelling requirements. The suit implies, they say, that Europeans should
not have the right to say or know what they eat.
The current trade debate is really
about food safety and the need to test a product before it is put up for
sale. How it is resolved could determine the course of agriculture.
Retailing
Innovation
needed to drive category sales
Retailers want innovative products
that will drive category sales before they will give them shelf space,
says Kathleen Kiley of Consumer Markets Insider, a trade magazine.
She writes “The competition for
shelf space in supermarkets, and the need for grocery stores to stay
competitive with low-cost mass merchants, has made introducing a new
product more important and risky. Not only does a new item have to be
successful on its own, but the new product is now expected to also drive
overall category sales growth.”
New products contribute to 70% of
any given category's overall sales growth, while established brands drive
the remaining 30%, according to Information Resources Inc (IRI), a market
researcher.
Consumers are looking for products
that save them time and make them feel better or look younger, says Kiley.
This helped drive sales of breakfast bars to $128 million from $97 million
in the first quarter a year ago.
"Manufacturers want a hot
product no one else has, and retailers are looking only to drive
traffic," says Stan Logan, KPMG industry sector leader of food and
beverage. New products hopefully create a new category, allowing companies
to develop complementary product lines and extensions, says Procter &
Gamble spokesman Robert Killins, citing the company's teeth whitener Crest
Whitestrips as an example.
IRI says the teeth whitening
category is one of the fastest growing for retailers, up by more than 300%
in the US in the last five years, says the American Academy of Cosmetic
Dentistry. Growth like that attracts competition. Having a great product
is not enough; getting it on the shelves and keeping it in stock is still
a problem, says Logan. Besides, it’s hard to be heard over the din of
more than 1,000 new launches a year.
Networking
New methods
for portal building in economic clusters
European researchers have developed
a new way of collecting and publishing information about their local
business community.
In an EU-sponsored project, they
“trained” Autonomy software to match businesses searching for products
and services in the Port of Rotterdam with local SMEs that provided the
requested services.
The software learned the context of
port services and transport and logistics. Researchers added to an
existing database of SMEs extra content regarding the products and
services delivered by these SMEs. To do this, they "spidered"
SMEs’ websites and created an upload tool to enable SMEs to add extra
relevant data.
The developers believe the approach
has relevance to other business sectors, particularly economic clusters
and business incubators. Details from the Gemeentelijk Havenbedrijf
Rotterdam. T +31-10-2521844 E schagen@portofrotterdam.com URL http://www.portofrotterdam.com. |
