Safe, my mate!

With food safety a top concern, many food and beverage processors are looking for new ways to preserve their products and to cut costs.

They could refer to the UK-based food research house CCFRA’s new concise introduction to new preservation technologies. After outlining the basics of spoilage, safety and the need for preservation systems, it covers new developments with heating, freezing and drying, and goes on to discuss high pressure processing, pulsed electric fields, power ultrasound and irradiation. References point to further information, highlighting those that are the next step. More details are at http://www.campden.co.uk/publ/PUBFILES/kt8.htm.

Egg-citing times for innovative bioplastic
Fork looms for hungry kids
Country of origin labels hit sticky patch

Sustainability

Egg-citing times for innovative bioplastic

Italian plastics converter ISAP is the first converter to produce a translucent egg tray from Cargill Dow’s maize-based biodegradable packaging material, NatureWorks PLA. The firm already uses it to make drinking cups and a hinged punnet for fresh fruit and vegetables.

ISAP export director Roberto Chiamenti says "The crystal clarity of the packaging emphasizes the quality of the product. Offering natural food products such as eggs in a nature-based package also seems to enhance customers' perceptions of the food, making it seem fresher and more wholesome."

Chiamenti says samples of the ISAP egg tray and punnet have been well received by retailers across northern Europe, and ISAP expects to have products on supermarket shelves in 2004.

NatureWorks PLA is a polymer made from plants such as maize. The polymer-building process, developed by US chemical firm Cargill Dow, breaks down plant starches into natural plant sugars. These are fermented and separated to harvest the carbon and other elements used to make the plastic polylactide (PLA).

Cargill Dow opened a 140,000t/y commercial factory in Blair, Nebraska in April 2002 to supply world demand. The material was recently introduced in Europe. Other firms converting it include Illip, Amprica, Treofan, Faerchplast and Veriplast; users include Italian hypermarket chain IPER, and organic pasta manufacturer Biorigin.

Converters can use the material with existing moulds and machinery with only slight changes to temperature and drying parameters. It can replace oil-based plastics such as polystyrene and PET in rigid applications, and cellophane, polypropylene or nylon films. In addition, taken over the lifetime to disposal, it uses 20% to 50% less fossil fuel than traditional thermoplastics, claims Cargill Dow.

The maker won’t be drawn on comparative resin costs, but says retailers, who normally lose 7-8% due to breakage, are noticing savings because consumers no longer open the package to see the contents. 

Apart from fresh food packaging, converters are using NatureWorks to make serviceware such as cold drink cups, cutlery and tableware, and to package consumer goods. Sony Pacific uses it for a blister package for portable radios, and film wrap for their mini-discs. Dunlop Pacific uses the film as an eco-friendly packaging option for golf balls.

Nutrition

Fork looms for hungry kids

The number of hungry children could double or halve for 50 years, depending on agricultural policy makers’ actions over the next two years, says Joachim von Braun, director general of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).

“Fifty years from now, one child in four could be suffering from chronic hunger, or it could drop to one child in ten. The outcome depends on decisions made now and in the next few years," says von Braun, in a paper for the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research meeting tomorrow.

Under an optimistic scenario, the research projects that 38m children will be malnourished in 2050, down from the current 166m. This scenario needs

• More public spending on agricultural and rural development by both developing and industrialised countries

• More investment in agricultural research

• High levels of investment in education, social services, and health

• Better irrigation efficiency

After 2015, this would improve child nutrition steadily in all developing countries. Latin America, the Middle East, and China would have almost no child malnutrition by 2030.

The paper also provides two pessimistic scenarios, which leave 135m-140m children malnourished in 2025. The "policy failure" scenario assumes more conflict over policies to increase investment, no progress on agricultural trade negotiations, more protectionism, and other political failures. The "technology and resource management failure" scenario assumes water mismanagement, worsening pest problems, and lack of adaptation to climate change.

Under these scenarios, child malnutrition in developing countries actually increases until 2015, and then declines modestly thereafter. In sub-Saharan Africa, child malnutrition rates grow through 2050.

Labels

Country of origin labels hit sticky patch

US food processors and meat firms have come out strongly against US Department of Agriculture proposals on country of origin labels. They claim that compliance will add billions in costs and increase prices to consumers.

Industry spokesman National Food Processors Association (NFPA) said the proposed rule will be operationally impractical for both food processors and retailers.

"From a technical standpoint, the labelling requirements will be extremely difficult to achieve and will require a huge investment by the food industry," the NFPA’s vice president federal and state affairs Dr Alan Matthys noted. "In the first year alone, USDA estimates that compliance with the requirements will cost the industry several billion dollars and roughly half a billion dollars annually thereafter. These are extraordinary costs that ultimately provide minimal benefit to consumers."

The American Meat Institute reckons start-up costs at close to $4bn, $2.4bn of it coming from the meat industry. “If there were billions to be made through a country of origin labelling program, the meat industry would have done it already,” said AMI president Patrick Boyle. “Still, if there are people out there who believe that country or origin labelling stands to benefit them, then we say go for it. Implement a country of origin labelling programme, just do so voluntarily."