Breaking News on the Food and Drink Manufacturing Sector

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Food manufacturers get pensions lifeline

17-May-2013 - Food companies struggling to address deficits in their pension funds have been thrown a lifeline by the government appointed watch-dog that oversees company pension schemes.

Vitafoods 2013

Food firms fail to tackle key health claim needs: EFSA

15-May-2013 - Functional food firms are failing to win health claim approval for their products because they are repeatedly neglecting two of the three key requirements for success, the man in charge of the process has revealed.

Food firm ordered to pay £32k for severed fingertips

14-May-2013 - A Derbyshire food company has been ordered to pay more than £32,000 after an employee severed the tip of his finger in a mincing machine.

Food taxes will not beat obesity: manufacturers

08-May-2013 - Food taxes introduced by some EU member states to discourage the consumption of ‘unhealthy’ foods will not tackle obesity and risks hindering the competitiveness of EU food and drink industries, warns the manufacturers’ organisation FoodDrinkEurope.

BPEX launches pig welfare assurance database

08-May-2013 - The British Pig Executive (BPEX) has launched a new online database to showcase pigs that adhere to the Red Tractor welfare assurance scheme.

Butchery firm to pay £6.4k for ‘preventable’ accident

07-May-2013 - A large butchery firm has been ordered to pay £6,440 for safety failings after an employee sliced his forearm because his safety gloves offered insufficient protection.

‘Bring Stilton back to its original home’

07-May-2013 - A food manufacturer based in the village of Stilton in Cambridgeshire is campaigning for the right to name the cheese his company makes Stilton.

Scotch whisky group appeals against minimum alcohol price ruling

07-May-2013 - The Scotch Whisky Association’s (SWA’s) legal challenge to Scottish government plans to set a minimum price for alcoholic drink has failed and the “disappointed” organisation will appeal against the judge’s decision.

News in brief

Government launches ‘wide-ranging’ horsemeat review

17-Apr-2013 - The government has announced a “wide-ranging” review of the horsemeat scandal to “restore and maintain consumer confidence” in the food chain.

Call for a tax on unsustainable food: Food Ethics Council

08-Apr-2013 - Taxes should be levied on “unsustainable foods” as well as those that are deemed to be unhealthy, claims the new executive director of the Food Ethics Council.

Moy Park pays £52,500 for chicken plant’s foul smell

08-Apr-2013 - Moy Park has been fined £10,000 and ordered to pay Environment Agency costs of £42,500 for emitting foul smells from its poultry unit in Kirkby on Bain, Lincolnshire.

Grain milling firm told to pay +£30k for lost fingers

27-Mar-2013 - A Northamptonshire grain firm has been ordered to pay £30,776 after a worker lost three fingers and a thumb on the unguarded blades of a running mixer.

News in brief

Lancashire Council discovers Hungarian horse meat labelled as beef

22-Mar-2013 - Lancashire Council is testing a consignment of horsemeat imported from Hungary labelled as beef for the presence of the veterinary drug 'bute'.

Food industrys’s top 10 budget Wish List

18-Mar-2013 - Help with rising fuel costs, less red tape and easier access to finance are top of food manufacturers’ Wish List for the 2013 budget. FoodManufacture.co.uk asked some of the industry’s key players what they would like to see in the Chancellor’s Budget this Wednesday (March 20).

News in brief

Confusion surrounds minimum pricing for alcohol

15-Mar-2013 - Government plans to introduce a 45p minimum pricing for alcohol in England and Wales appeared to be in disarray, as reports suggested Prime Minister David Cameron was preparing to ditch the proposal.

EU working group to discuss probiotic as a ‘general descriptor’

15-Mar-2013 - Hopes are rising that the use of the term ‘probiotic’ will not have to disappear on products following the failure of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) to give approval for a generic health claim for the ingredient last year.

Chinese clampdown with food import law

14-Mar-2013 - Manufacturers eyeing burgeoning export opportunities in China must comply with a raft of new legislation in order to trade in the country – or face strict new penalties.

Pie manufacturer told to pay £375,000 over fatality

11-Mar-2013 - A former west Yorkshire food manufacturer — Andrew Jones Pies, of Huddersfield, which is now in administration —  has been ordered to pay £375,000, after a gas explosion ripped through its bakery oven, killing a father of two and seriously injuring another worker.

Jobs will be lost if beer duty stamps approved

08-Mar-2013 - The head of a family brewery has said he'll have no choice but to take out a shift on his packaging line if the government brings in duty stamps for cans and bottled beers.

Cranswick Country Food pays £22,000 for head injury

05-Mar-2013 - Cranswick Country Foods has been ordered to pay £22,700, after its prosecution for safety failings that led to a worker receiving a serious head injury.

Euro Foods pays £18,000 for potentially deadly food adulteration

25-Feb-2013 - Ethnic food manufacturer and wholesaler Euro Foods was fined £6,000 and ordered to pay £12,000 costs after being found guilty of potentially fatal food adulteration in court recently (February 12).

News in brief

IKEA dragged into horsemeat scandal

25-Feb-2013 - Furniture giant IKEA has become the latest retailer to be drawn into the horsemeat scandal, after tests in the Czech Republic revealed traces of horsemeat in a consignment of meatballs made in Sweden.

Pie manufacturer guilty of blast that kills worker

25-Feb-2013 - A Huddersfield pie manufacturer has been found guilty of health and safety breaches that killed a factory worker in a gas oven explosion.

Horsemeat latest FSA tests still 99% negative

22-Feb-2013 - The Food Standards Agency (FSA) has revealed that 99% of nearly 3,600 tests for the presence of horse DNA on processed meat products have proved negative.

Welsh food manufacturer ‘gutted’ at horse news

22-Feb-2013 - A mid-Wales beef burger producer, whose website boasts “full traceability”, has told FoodManufacture.co.uk he was “gutted” to learn his beef burgers contained 1% or more of horse meat.

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