The British Soft Drinks Association (BSDA) has slammed the UK's VAT regime for food and drink as "archaic", "barking mad", and at odds with the government's public health agenda.

An announcement regarding legal action against Cadbury over its handling of last year's salmonella contamination, was "imminent" according to Birmingham council.

Princes, the canned food to soft drinks giant, is in the due diligence stage of two potential acquisitions which could help it reach its goal of breaking through the £1.5bn sales barrier two years ahead of schedule.

Global competition, rising prices, skills shortages and customer demand for lower costs are all key challenges facing food manufacturers in 2007. The way to meet this pressure and to maintain bottom line profitability is to improve efficiency and raise productivity.

Dublin-based investment firm Lioncourt Capital is understood to have entered into negotiations with HM Capital to buy the UK's second largest biscuit maker, Burtons Foods.

Staff at Bernard Matthews' avian flu-hit Holton site are anxiously waiting to see whether sales of the turkey producer's products recover quickly enough to keep them in work.

Diageo is making its largest single investment in Scotland for 20 years with plans to spend £100M on building a new malt distillery in Speyside and expanding its grain distillery in Fife to meet growing demand. The first mature spirit from the distillery, which is due to open in 2009, should be available from 2012, said the company.

Whyte & Mackay, the Glasgow-based whisky distiller, has reportedly reached agreement for the sale of the business for an unconfirmed £550M to India's United Breweries Group, led by boss Vijay Mallya.

Greencore will find out in May whether it is entitled to receive a larger payout for shutting down its Irish sugar processing business in response to European Union (EU) sugar reforms.

Retail baker Greggs has begun work to upgrade and expand facilities by 1,200m2 at its bakery at Treforest in South Wales. The first phase of the project, being carried out by Clegg Food Projects without stopping production, is expected to be completed by May and the final phase in August. Greggs has also recently built a new bakery at Cambuslang in Glasgow.

Ofcom's decision to extend restrictions on TV advertising of 'junk' foods to children up to 16 has frustrated the food industry.

It wasn't so long ago that a job was for life. But today, development staff are changing teams faster than David Beckham changes hair styles. And while staff motivation is an issue that all employers must tackle, it can mean the difference between success and failure when new product development (NPD) is at stake.

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) is split over the issue of whether nutritional labelling should extend to the catering sector.

Improve, the food and drink sector skills council, is looking for five new board directors. It hopes to have its new board in place by June 2007 to coincide with the start of the next phase of its development.

The Bakers, Food and Allied Workers' Union is balloting members on strike action at Park Cakes in Daubhill, Bolton, after bosses announced plans to cut almost a third of the workforce.

A new food safety scheme is to be launched this month to help small manufacturers meet customer requirements and comply with the law without spending a fortune on full audit schemes.

A seventh training organisation has joined the new £4.4M National Skills Academy for the food and drink manufacturing industry which opens in April. The Seafood Training Academy will specialise in training for seafood processing.

More timely advise on the risks associated with food scares should emerge as the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) sets about streamlining the way it collates and disseminates information.

About 100 staff at Tate & Lyle's factory in Selby, Yorkshire, will be made redundant this year following the firm's decision to stop producing citric acid there. Oversupply, price hikes in substrate and intense competition from China meant that Selby could no longer compete viably in an increasingly difficult market, it said.

Better results from its UK business have helped Heinz improve its performance in the third quarter, said Scott O'Hara, chief executive of Heinz Europe. "We expect to maintain our recent trend of double-digit increases in R&D spending. We will launch more than 100 new products in Europe in fiscal year 2008."

Moves by soft drinks giant Coca-Cola Enterprises to slash 5% of its global workforce would not change its 2007 business plan in Great Britain, said the company. "There is no specific commitment or target for job losses in Europe. We will talk to employees and employee representatives on specific projects when we have actual proposals."

Annual exports of British meat and livestock products have broken the £1bn barrier for the first time in a decade, according to new figures from the Meat & Livestock Commission (MLC). In its first year of full export trading, British beef exports topped 40,000t, well ahead of original estimates of 30,000t, said the MLC.

A third of respondents in a Food Standards Agency (FSA) survey found food labels difficult to understand, and two-fifths found the print on labels hard to read. Only 52% of those questioned knew what a 'best before' date was, and just 61% of respondents grasped the meaning of 'use by'.

Hovis Invisible Crust is the first bread to be baked without a crust. Warburtons' Healthy Inside is baked with a natural prebiotic ingredient. Allied Bakeries' Burgen brand offers a choice of Soya & Linseed, Hi-Bran, or Wholegrain & Cranberry loaves. And now Tesco is selling a wholegrain loaf containing 17% Guinness.

The Food and Drink Federation (FDF) has joined forces with farming organisations to bring food manufacturers and farmers together after a survey of 3,500 UK food businesses showed the potential for improved trading relations.

Workplace accidents could increase if the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) goes ahead with plans to scrap one of its two inspectors responsible for national food and agriculture safety policies, retail union USDAW has warned.

Inter Link Foods boss Chris Thompson has admitted that the firm's failure to bring in external expertise to help manage its recent transition to a centralised distribution system was a fundamental mistake. He warned that the distribution switch would push it into the red for the year.

Consumers are as worried about healthy eating as they are about drugs, according to the Food Standards Agency (FSA).

UK meat officials are lobbying hard for an early end to cattle meat safety regulations which, they claim, have distorted the market for slow-matured beef.

A wave of new appointments at the top of the UK's largest 500 food manufacturing companies heralds a radical change in their business behaviour and increased pressure on those companies with ageing boardrooms, suggests food industry analyst Plimsoll Publishing.

Small food manufacturers in eastern Scotland can now get advice to develop new products and processes with the launch of a new initiative by the University of Abertay Dundee, which will offer consultancy and applied research to companies in the region.

IGD, which provides research for the retail and food manufacturing sector, has bolstered its senior team with a number of internal promotions designed to meet the rapid changes taking place in the food and grocery industry.

Meat processors are missing a valuable export opportunity in red meat offal, according to the English Beef and Lamb Executive, which is organising two seminars this month to stimulate interest in offal.

Arla Foods has committed itself to buying 90% of its total milk requirements from Arla Foods Milk Partnership (AFMP), the group of milk suppliers to Arla, within the next 12 months.

The two leading exhibitions for the baking industry are to come together in 2008.

Unions say they are still in the dark over the reasons for the sudden demise of own-label frozen desserts manufacturer Bonne Bouche.

The organic farming business, Laverstoke Park, founded by South African multimillionaire and ex-Formula One World Champion Jody Scheckter, and styled as "the biggest small-holding in the world", has opened a new purpose-built meat processing plant next to its abattoir in Overton, Hampshire.

At its board meeting on February 15, the Foods Standards Agency (FSA) discussed the subject of openness and whether it could be more open than it already was. A 20-page paper on the subject was prepared for consideration by the board.

It's said that when Andy Warhol painted 50 Campbell's soup cans on a canvas back in 1968, he wasn't making a grand artistic statement; he just liked soup.

Joint venture partners Princes Foods and ADM are developing a fat-busting diacylglycerol 'DAG' oil that could 'revolutionise' the edible oils category in the UK, according to Princes marketing boss Tim Jolly.

Which came first, the science or the fiction? It's funny how science seems to follow fiction and I remember as a child watching Captain Kirk flip open his communicator and wishing I had one, instead of a block of wood!

Achieving the right contrast between a creamy filling and the firmer texture of the bread is vital to the success of a sandwich. Soggy bread can be a major problem for prawn sandwich processors when seafood dressings leak into the bread. Mayonnaise and sandwich dressing manufacturer Cremanaze claims to have a solution in the form of its latest product.

A new range of halal baby foods has been launched by GEM Foods, a division of Global Enterprise Management.

In a bid to discover what Brits are looking for in a pasty, Proper Cornish Food Company set up a competition where consumers could suggest new flavours.

Unilever is putting £6.5M behind its Magnum brand and introducing two new flavours to the range.

Manufacturer Soya Health Foods has launched an Organic Honey and Vanilla Breakfast Soya beverage, which the firm claims is the first soya milk that doesn't curdle in hot tea. The drink is part of the new Sunrise Healthy Start range of soya breakfast drinks and the firm says it balances taste with cholesterol-lowering benefits.

Butt Foods has complemented its Bread Bowls creation with Bread Boats - containers made from bread which is strong enough to hold moisture-rich fillings, but soft enough to eat.

Confectionery giant Cadbury's expansion into the UK chewing gum market last month is a sure sign that the sticky substance is making a comeback. Although the UK gum market has been in decline for two years, globally it is the fastest-growing part of the confectionery sector. Having increased by over 8% in the last five years, it is currently worth £250-300M.

As the market for healthy beverages continues to grow, mineral product developer Marigot offers a functional ingredient, which can be added to drinks without causing sedimentation.

It is that time of year when one starts venturing into the great outdoors more often and contemplating the garden. Leafing through a plant catalogue recently I was surprised to come across health claims in relation to promotion of blueberry bushes being sold as patio plants but also as sources of the fruit. Looking at a selection of further sources I found the fruit to be "the best health food", "a powerful vitamin source" and "health-giving".

A major push from manufacturers has seen consumers develop a more meaningful relationship with meat. People aren't just picking the cheapest cuts any more - they want to know where the product is from, its nutritional profile, and the environmental factors affected by its production.

Sadly, this survey went out just before Bernard Matthews hit the headlines and breathless broadcasters told us all not to panic before issuing dire warnings about the impact of avian flu on poultry sales.

Britain's food manufacturers are missing out on a cool £80M a year in potential cost savings by not operating their refrigeration systems more efficiently, according to a new industry-led study which is offering advice on how to get quick returns on investment.

Is there anything more worrying than the collective intelligence of the fridge of the future? As we move into an increasingly digital age it's not just the fridge that will have the intelligence but the food packaging is going to be smart, too. Your fridge will know more about you and your eating and drinking habits than your best friend.

With healthy living here to stay, the demand for clean labelling has never been greater as consumers perceive additive-free products to be better for them.

Another firm keen to meet manufacturers' clean label requirements is UK ingredients supplier Zeelandia, which has launched a hydrogenated fat-free version of its Zedomals Liquid.

Bakers can now save time when adding wholegrain to products by using Tendergrains.

You can't beat the smell and taste of fresh baked bread, and bakery and confectionery ingredients supplier Puratos UK is hoping its new range will capture just that.

GlaxoSmithkline (GSK) says it is moving away from using polyvinyl chloride (PVC) shrinksleeves on its beverage bottles because the sleeve material is stopping the polyethylene terephthalate (PET) in the pack from being recycled.

National newspaper campaigns and a flurry of parliamentary Early Day Motions (EDMs) targetting 'excessive packaging' have underlined the need for a revitalised watchdog in this area, says the Industry Council for Packaging and the Environment (INCPEN).

Tesco has chosen to pack a range of frozen vegetables in polyethylene-based 'oxydegradable' bags, having previously opted to use similar materials for all of its carrier bags.

The European Food Safety Authority has issued new guidance on safe levels of bisphenol A (BPA) in contact with food to address concerns and confusion about its use.

Consumer confidence in the food supply chain has taken another battering following the discovery of avian flu in turkeys at Bernard Matthews' Holton plant in Suffolk. The discovery resulted in the slaughter of around 159,000 birds and fears that meat from infected birds might have entered the food chain.

Several very large manufacturers operate dedicated vehicles for customer delivery, claiming that they have 'critical mass' and can cut out the third-party logistic supplier's (3PLs) profit margin by doing their own thing. One I came across recently had justified continuation of the dedicated fleet on the grounds of reliability and cost. It had benchmarked costs by asking two of the very few remaining major 3PLs to quote for all the customer delivery business - but not for factory clearance. The processor's business consisted of 100% full loads for factory clearance, 70% full loads to the major multiples, 20% mid-sized orders to wholesalers and 10% very small orders to other channels, which accounted for a high proportion of consignments.

Brian Douglas, manufacturing manager, Jus-Rol

Ask the average punter what he knows about Princes, and he'll probably come up with tinned tuna or meat paste. What he almost certainly doesn't realise is that Princes is also the UK's number one supplier of own-label soft drinks, the number one supplier of cooking and speciality oils, the owner of the UK's fastest growing Italian food and natural mineral water brands (Napolina, Aqua Pura) and its largest canned food supplier, with a turnover approaching £1bn.

Auditor competence is very much under the spotlight as it emerges that some food safety certificates aren't worth the paper they're written on.

There's an air of anticipation at the Hull-based Cranswick Lazenby's factory today, somewhat reminiscent of those school days when somebody famous is coming to visit. Except today the staff aren't expecting a film star or rock god - it's the SAI Global/Efsis inspector.

We're all skating on thin ice, it was reported in the film An Inconvenient Truth (2006). Following last month's report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change showing incontrovertible proof of man's influence on global warming, the subject has moved centre stage. With refrigeration recognised as a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, where does that leave the cold storage and distribution sector?

When 3663 First for Foodservice wanted to automate the transfer of fresh chicken destined for KFC to its two regional distribution centres (RDCs) at Royton and Banbury, it called in Industrial Automation (IAL) which set about inventing a machine to transfer a pallet-full of trays on to a set of dolleys.

Temperature control is vital to Ginsters, part of the Samworth Brothers business, in the production of 150M pies, pasties and sausage rolls at its Cornwall site. So it called on Loma Scientific to provide one of its Celsius non-invasive temperature management systems to monitor three lines.

Logitrans now offers 100% stainless steel, fully-powered pallet trucks and stackers, specially developed for wet and aggressive environments as well as severe hygiene demands. The trucks can operate in temperatures down to -30ºC.

Datalogic, the hand-held barcode reader specialist, has launched a new family of Dragon hand-held laser scanners designed to withstand the toughest environmental conditions without losing barcode reading performance and reliability.

Raw materials arrive at food sites in a wide variety of ways, depending upon their nature, volume and origin. Sugar and flour, for example, can be delivered in anything from 1kg bags to a 20t road tanker.

Brand leader Premier Foods has installed two Spiroflow big bag dischargers and four Spiroflow flexible screw conveyors to deliver Smash instant mashed potato to packing lines at its Histon site.

Shopfloor networking and hardware specialist DLoG UK has introduced its new X10/X12 vehicle-mounted wireless networking and touch screen computer. By connecting to warehouse management systems, it provides up-to-the-minute information to forklift truck drivers on items to be picked.

An orifice gate valve for dry bulk solids handling makes two major advances in a single design. Manufactured in the US by Vortex, the Quantum is constructed from just 12 lightweight components.

The new processing and packaging exhibition Pro2Pac at ExCeL, London, March 18-21, will showcase the latest processing and packaging developments and innovations for the food and drink industries.

Witt Gas Techniques, the gas safety, control, mixing and analysis equipment supplier, will be exhibiting and providing information on a range of gas distribution, mixing and analysis equipment for modified atmosphere packaging (MAP) on stand DO5.

Priorclave, stand F25, will be exhibiting examples of its front and top loading laboratory autoclaves. All feature the BioCote anti-microbial coating, which is effective against microbial growth on working surfaces to provide a second line of defence in the fight against cross-infection in the laboratory. Priorclave autoclaves are the only autoclaves to kill micro-organisms when turned off.

Nilfisk-ALTO's product range and consultancy service for cleaning in the food processing industry will be on show on stand F32. Because there is no one solution to the cleaning needs of the food industry, Nilfisk-ALTO has developed a broad range of pressure washers, scrubber dryers and vacuums.

From sausage making to salad preparation, Chalcroft Construction's dedicated Food Projects division (stand B45) can design and build a factory for any food process. The company offers complete turnkey solutions, with specialist experience in providing controlled atmospheres for high-care food processes.

Alexir Packaging, specialist manufacturer of printed folding cartons, has developed a more environmentally friendly packaging solution for ready meals, salads and other tray-based products.

IFE07, the International Food and Drink Event, is the UK's leading international food & drink trade event. Held alongside the Pro2Pac processing equipment show at the ExCel, London, March 18-21, it has 14 specialist sections ranging from health and wellbeing to ethnic and cultural foods.

The Smoothsolution package from D2 Europack has been developed to ensure high quality, consistent sealing. On show on stand A36, it comprises Smoothpack smoothwall aluminium foil trays, including the company's newly-launched 276 series; Smoothpeel lidding film; Smoothdome clip-on or heat sealable dome-shaped lids; and the new Smoothseal family of tray sealing equipment.

The Metal Detector Checkweigher from Easiweigh provides accurate weight control while ensuring that the product is free from any metal particles in one integrated operation.

Seeley International has introduced a new industrial wall controller for evaporative cooling systems. The IWC-05 enables just one wall controller to handle up to 10 smart hubs and control up to 41 Seeley Breezair evaporative coolers.

AxFlow has introduced a new hygienic pump from Wilden that is capable of handling even the most demanding food applications. The 38mm Wilden PV4 stainless steel pump is compliant to the hygienic engineering design guidelines of EHEDG, the European consortium of equipment manufacturers, food industries, research institutes, and public health authorities. It can be configured to satisfy clean-in-place requirements for the prevention of microbial contamination.

Barcoding.co.uk has launched a label printing system that works independently of a computer. The Solo system is ideal for warehouses, factories and packing areas where a computer is unsuitable. It comprises a robust stand-alone keyboard with an integrated display. It simply connects to a label printer as well as devices such as barcode scanners and weigh scales.

Wellingborough-based Major International has installed two Laska bowl choppers supplied by food equipment specialist Union Food Machinery. The machines are being used to manufacture stock bases, sauces, soups and gravies.