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You will notice this a new-look format newsletter – the result of shifting to a different email service provider who makes the task of working in the beast that is HTML all the easier and simpler!
Top story today has to be the formation of a new African drinks giant, created via last week’s deal between SABMiller, Coca-Cola and Sabco; and which sees Coke take over our iconic Appletiser brand.
And then there’s news of a fascinating new product created by a very clever South African scientist to verify CIP cleaning. It aims to solve an ongoing quality/safety conundrum and should prove a welcome addition to every food-bev lab.
 SABMiller and Coca-Cola plan to form one of the world’s largest bottling operations with annual revenue of almost R33bn ($3bn) in 12 markets across southern and east Africa under the name of Coca-Cola Beverages Africa. Coca-Cola will also acquire the Appletiser brand from SABMIller.
 An ingenious new food-beverage safety tool, CARBOTECT is an organic (carbohydrate) detection tool developed by a South African scientist as an instant pass/fail diagnostic test to gauge the efficacy of clean-in-place processes.
Enjoy this week’s read!
Brenda Neall
Publisher/Editor
FOODStuff SA is a hub for food-drinks industry jobs!
WOOLWORTHS posted three new positions last week! Click here for details
 Congratulations to the 12 winners of the recent DRINKStuff SA – Amarula Cream Give-Away! Fran Peacock-Edwards (Delite Foods), Jacques van den Berg (Appletiser), Dries van Niekerk (General Mills SA), Helen Digby (Sally Williams Fine Foods), Penny Barber (Nestlé South Africa), Craig Miller (FIRI Consulting), Demona Schnetler (Klein Karoo International); Donavon Jooste (Shoprite), Jacqueline Nyembe (Sunspray Food Ingredients), Gabriella Arendse (Tiger Brands), Tshamano Magodi (Mars Africa), Judy Day (Afriplex).
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This week on FOODStuff SA!
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 Local olive oil producers are in for a bumper year, courtesy of Spain, where drought is expected to cut production by more than 50%.
 The US FDA has announced sweeping rules that will require chain restaurants, movie theatres and pizza parlours across the country to post calorie counts on their menus. Health experts said the new requirements would help combat the country’s obesity epidemic by showing Americans just how many calories lurk in their favourite foods.
 Finnish agro-food giant, Raisio, is buying back the licensing rights to its cholesterol-lowering, plant stanol-based Benecol brand. A leader in this functional arena in Europe, Benecol has struggled in the North American market.
Thousands of rats will be fed Monsanto maize diets in a $23m, three-year ‘Factor GMO’ study into long-term health effects of GM food and associated pesticides.
 The liquid that comes off of a defrosting chicken provides a safe harbour for Campylobacter, and turns a surface into a protein-rich environment in which it can form a protective biofilm, according to a new study.
 As we all know in South Africa, Prof Tim Noakes has been, and still is, demonised for changing his mind a few years ago on the role of carbohydrates in the diet in favour of a low-carb, high-fat (LCHF, also known as Banting) diet for people who are insulin resistant or diabetic. Now, a small but significant study by US scientist, Dr Jeff Volek, helps to explain why Noakes does indeed have some more science on his side to support his LCHF diet.
 A new report from the UK’s Leatherhead Food Research has revealed that, many problems aside, the global market for food and drinks offering functional health benefits still continues to increase in size.
 It’s that time once again where any number of commentators, research houses, analysts and media pull back the curtain and reveal their annual food-drink and shopping predictions. Here are those from Phil Lempert in the US, well known as the ‘Supermarket Guru’, and based on his company’s research and conducted with partner ConAgra Foods.
 Big data isn’t just for marketing firms and government agencies. As one of the largest industries in the world, it makes sense that the food industry is adopting big data technology to better understand and serve customers. Here are a few ways the food industry is using big data to reach a wider customer base, increase efficiency and cater to the tastes of the consumer.
Today, space food has come a long way. It’s no longer about astronauts simply meeting a calorie requirement while on short trips to the moon; it’s about them living semi-comfortably in space over months. Here’s an overview of what’s changed since the 1960s — and what’s happening next.
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ICYMI: Recent FOODStuff SA news!
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 Tiger Brand’s released its full year results for the year ended 30 September 2014. They weren’t pretty. CE, Peter Matlare, gets questioned on the shortcomings and accountability of the massive loss incurred with its Nigerian Dangote Flour investment.
 Making front page, lead story headlines today in the Cape Times... A family-run jam and preserves producer in Montague, Western Cape, has found itself in a David and Goliath-like legal pickle…
SAAFoST (SA Association for Food Science & Technology) has announced the dates and details of its biennial congress, taking place next year in Durban. An event to diarise for all local food industrialists.
Chicken producers have cut back on volumes over the past two years as pressure on disposable incomes and strikes have forced some consumers to switch to other proteins such as polony and beans.
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This week on DRINKStuff SA!
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 Pioneer Food, the maker of Ceres fruit drinks and dozens of other food and beverage brands, says it will exit the deal that gives it bottling rights for PepsiCo in South Africa by the middle of next year.
 Could premium milk be the greatest coup for beverage companies since bottled water? Coca-Cola apparently thinks so.
 Coffee is the ultimate “on the go” beverage, generally via restaurants and coffee houses. Packaged coffee creamer products had largely been shut out of this market until the launch of new Nestlé Coffee-Mate 2Go concentrated coffee creamer, a “triple strength” liquid creamer in a spill-resistant, portable plastic bottle with 18 servings.
 For the creator of Bulletproof Coffee, the butter-infused, “low-toxin” coffee that’s created a media storm, the epiphany of the Bulletproof lifestyle came thousands of miles from home after drinking a strange brew.
 A new book looking at the success – and cost – behind the Coca-Cola name has been published, and takes a fresh look at how soda companies managed to make fortunes selling cheap sugar water.
 The British owner of a French wine company has created a viral hit on YouTube with his sassy video on how to open a bottle of wine without a corkscrew. Nearly 8.5 million people have watched it to date – and no wonder, as it sure offers great advice!
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ICYMI: Last week on DRINKStuff SA!
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 KWV has launched the world’s first ‘natural’ Pinotage wine, Earth’s Essence, that has ‘no sulphites or preservatives added’, made possible by utilising world-first technology. This follows KWV’s joint acquisition of the patent for a revolutionary process using indigenous rooibos and honeybush wood during various stages in the winemaking process.
 Scottish Leader, one of the world’s favourite blended Scotch whiskies, sold in 60 countries, is revitalising with a new look, an enhanced recipe and the introduction of an additional, premium Signature blend. The brand is now owned by Distell after its purchase of Burn Stewart Distillers in April 2013.
If you ban ads, the world will be a healthier and better place, or so the government seems to think… Wrong! writes veteran SA marketing and advertising commentator, Chris Moerdyk.
 This article comes with a WARNING! Because it may well be the last time you drink a take-out coffee with your innocence intact….
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News from around the web…
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From bold Asian and Hispanic flavours, to nuts, gourmet coffee, and all-day-breakfasts, New York-based Comax Flavors highlights four hot trends likely to influence food and beverage development in 2015.
We know: your inbox is already full of MUST-READ predictions for 2015. And no doubt some of them were great. This list is different. First, it’s consumer trends that we’re interested in. Not the ongoing macro-trends that will form the backdrop to 2015.
They’re selling everything from coffee leaf tea to maple water, banana-based snacks and hummus (minus the chickpeas). Here’s FoodNavigator-USA’s latest pick of entrepreneurs to watch in the US food and beverage market.
Chicken chain Nando’s has expanded its restaurants further across the country in the past year, driving its revenues up more than 10pc but curbing its profits.
Cereal Partners Worldwide (CPW) has developed Nestlé gluten-free cornflakes for select European countries to capture increasing interest from non-celiac dieters. [All about marketing? Corn is gluten-free? Ed]
Faced with mounting difficulties in their drug businesses, many pharmaceutical manufacturers are looking at getting into functional foods and beverages, notes food marketing expert, Julian Mellentin in this guest article.
Every day, in a city the size of London, 30 million meals are served. But where does all the food come from? Architect Carolyn Steel discusses the daily miracle of feeding a city, and shows how ancient food routes shaped the modern world.
Social psychologist Emily Balcetis shows research that addresses one of the many factors: Vision. In an informative talk, she shows how when it comes to fitness, some people quite literally see the world differently from others — and offers a surprisingly simple solution to overcome these differences.
There is a fundamental flaw in the way medical professionals measure overweight and obesity. The problem? That BMI doesn’t differentiate between fat weight and muscle weight, which means that this scale thinks a 300-pound basketball player and a 300-pound video game player are pretty much the same guy, as long as they’re roughly the same height.
More than a few years ago, I made a decision that I never dreamed would result in one of my children having to fight for his life. I was looking for a way to improve my children’s immune systems… I don’t really remember when I first ran across the idea of drinking raw (unpasteurized) milk.
When reformulating products companies shouldn’t forget about the texture as consumers don’t want to compromise on it anymore, according to Ingredion.
Toshiba, the Japanese maker of laptops and TVs, has a new project — growing lettuce with no soil and in the cleanest of clean rooms. The project, which is hosted in the company’s old factory, is part of the company’s push into the healthcare business.
The ideas that wheat is genetically modified, bred to have more gluten, is addictive and causes inflammation are “myths” that the US Whole Grains Council wants to bust.
We all know that you should boil only what you need in a kettle to avoid wasting energy, but overfilling is still very common. The Miito combats this problem by using induction heating to boil just the water you need. |
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Food Bites… They said it….
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Hold the sustainable sanctimony
 “MARKETING was once about selling the sizzle rather than the steak. Now it’s more and more about selling ‘sustainability’, a paradoxical concept which condemns consumption even as it is used to promote it.
“Food now carries a particularly heavy burden of angst, from obsessions about hormones, gluten, and artificial preservatives to hysteria about genetic modification, chicken cruelty and carbon hoofprints.”
The consumer-centric approach for nutritional ingredients
“‘IT is not our responsibility to market to consumers,’ say many nutrition ingredient companies.
“No, but it is a long-term business opportunity to sustain better nutritional ingredients business. Why would you want to relinquish that power?”
Virpi Varjonen, nutrition market analyst and strategist,
Invenire Market Intelligence, read more
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