The UK university system is failing to create the right people to allow the food and drink sector to grow, and the anticipated post-Brexit fall in overseas workers will only exacerbate the problem, a Northern Ireland trade body has claimed.
The next 12 months will prove pivotal in determining whether the UK can negotiate a favourable free-trade deal with the EU that meets the needs of food and drink manufacturers.
Four Northern Ireland food and drink manufacturers have secured trade deals to China, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Europe, in deals worth a collective £500,000.
Politicians have been urged to protect Britain’s £110bn food and farming sector, after Theresa May’s snap general election backfired and resulted in a hung parliament.
Northern Ireland now has a new focus for food innovation, following the official opening in November by North West Regional College (NWRC) of the region’s first centre of excellence for food development and technology.
The number of migrants working in Northern Ireland’s food and drink sector should be regulated by regional government, recommends a Northern Ireland Food & Drink Association (NIFDA) report.
Eight workers were prevented from harvesting leeks in the Republic of Ireland for a Northern Ireland vegetable producer, after the Gardai Irish police detained them at a checkpoint.
Mash Direct, the vegetable accompaniments brand, is targeting major growth in the south of England and aiming to become a truly national brand across the UK, following a new deal with Tesco.
Poultry processor Moy Park has completed the first phase of a £20M investment to turn a 40-year-old factory into one of Europe’s most advanced processing plants.
Vegetable accompaniments business Mash Direct is targeting a turnover boost of £2M in the next six months, after securing an annual deal, worth £3M, with the UK’s second biggest supermarket Asda.
A £3M food innovation centre has been opened in Northern Ireland, designed to help especially smaller businesses and artisans develop new products for consumers.
Greggs’s first foray into Northern Ireland offers the food-to-go and bakery chain “good medium-term expansion potential”, according to one leading food industry analyst.
A Northern Irish man was jailed, fined £8,000 and banned from managing poultry processing firms after officials found nine food safety breaches at his business, Upper Erne Lakes Poultry in Newtownbutler.
Yorkie bars and Quality Street helped to sweeten the results of food manufacturing giant Nestlé, in the UK and Ireland, according to its full-year financial results released yesterday (February 13).
Whitehall plans for a single front-of-pack nutritional labelling scheme could be torpedoed by the devolved governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Northern Ireland’s food and drink sector is not only weathering the global economic recession but thriving, according to a government report and industry leaders.
Unite the Union says it has begun a conciliation process with Kerry Foods via a third-party mediator, aimed at resolving a pay dispute at the firm’s Omagh site.