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Editor’s Stuff: RCL quickly evolving into mega food giant!
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TOP LOCAL NEWS this week has to be RCL Food’s latest diversification move – it bought Foodcorp in April and now it’s putting TSB Sugar in its expanding pocket. TSB is one of South Africa’s leading producers of sugar (producing 30% of total output) with Selati being its flagship brand.
A share issue of RCL Foods’ stock will pay for the R4bn deal. RCL said the deal would help it “create a more broadly diversified revenue stream” and help it reach “critical mass” in the industry.
It added the transaction would also help it “establish an attractive, well capitalised agri-foods platform for future sub-Saharan Africa expansion opportunities”.
Top international news is out of Germany, and the announcement of the FiE Awards last week at FIE 2013 in Frankfurt, the world’s leading expo for food and beverage ingredients.
Roquette’s innovative new microalgae High Lipid Algal Flour was recognised as the most innovative food ingredient – successfully reducing fat and replacing eggs while providing sustainability, health, functionality and cost benefits to producers and consumers alike. It was also voted best bakery ingredient.
Enjoy this week’s read!
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| Local News and Developments |
COMMENT: Competition heats up as food firms hype brands
Competition is heating up in the food producers’ kitchen, and they all plan to stay. Last week, in his company’s year-end results, Tiger Brands chief executive Peter Matlare said that as much as things were tough in the South African market the company believed its power brands would deliver good volumes, comments Business Report. |
“Share a Coke” campaign comes to Africa
November has seen the launch by Coca-Cola South Africa of the hugely-successful international “Share a Coke” campaign – and has inspired hordes of people to seek out 550ml Coke bottles and 330ml cans with their names on them. |
SU’s research headlines gives rise to new meat labelling regulations
New meat labelling regulations recently published (October 25, 2013) in the Government Gazette on the labelling of imported meat products in particular, arose from the research by meat experts at Stellenbosch University (SU) who brought the illegal practices of suppliers of processed meat to light earlier this year. |
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Talking to SAB’s new MD Mauricio Leyva is not a man to be overwhelmed by tradition. He appears to have given little thought to the fact that he is the first non-South African to head up a local company that can, at a stretch, trace its origins back to 1895.
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The product developers at Tiger Brand’s Enterprise division have clearly been very busy, with four new ranges launched recently, notably a line-up of premium ‘Chef’s Cut’ processed meats – and in line with the trend for upmarket, authentic foods that do no evoke images of factory conveyor belts, an adaption seen as necessary for fueling steady growth.
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Nampak Glass wins energy management ticket
Nampak Glass has become the first company in South Africa to win ISO 50001: 2011 certification, the energy management standard, as audited and certified by SGS South Africa. |
Sugar demand in Africa outstrips supply
Africa is one of the largest producers of sugar in the world, and an even larger consumer of the commodity, with demand likely to outstrip supply as the continent’s population grows and the increasing and more affluent middle class can afford to spend more. |
PIWOSA promotes top SA wines in the UK market
Looking to boost the deserved reputation of premium South African wines, top-notch independent wineries in the Western Cape are collaborating through PIWOSA, Premium Independent Winemakers of South Africa, to boost their wine sales in the UK; SA’s leading wine export market. |
In case you missed it: Unilever invests R500m in new Midrand ice cream factory
Unilever South Africa has broken ground on an envisaged R500-million ice-cream manufacturing facility, in Midrand. |
Building brands in Africa
To reach Africa’s poorest consumers, face-to-face contact works best. The Economist looks at how brands are building loyalty among Africa’s lower-income consumers. |
Woolies’ Nigeria fail points to basic problem with Africa
Woolworths’ decision to pull out of Nigeria highlights one of the main problems with building consumer businesses in Africa: its lack of a real middle class. |
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International Developments
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A heavily criticised rat study that linked Monsanto’s genetically modified maize and the herbicide Roundup to increased cancer risks is set to be withdrawn by the journal that published it.
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Unilever and Ferrero palm oil pledges show ‘an industry in transformation’
Unilever and Ferrero both said they would strengthen their commitments to sustainable palm oil this week – a sign of an industry in transformation, according to Catapult, an organisation working to end trade in commodities linked to deforestation. |
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Coke acquires remaining stake in Zico
With sales of its traditional sodas under pressure, Coca-Cola has announced the acquisition of its outstanding ownership stake in Zico, the premium coconut water brand.
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December 5, 2013, marks the 80th anniversary of the ratification of the 21st Amendment which ended Prohibition in the US. And in the eight decades that have followed those 14 long, dry years, those in the beverage alcohol business have been doing their best to ensure that the lessons of Prohibition are never forgotten. |
ICYMI: Starbucks to pay Kraft nearly $2.8bn
Starbucks has been ordered by an arbitor to pay Kraft’s former parent, Mondelez International, $2.23-billion in damages after the coffee chain’s early termination of a grocery distribution deal. |
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| Trends, Marketing and NPD |
2014: The year of transformative flavours?
Consumers will enter a whole new arena of tasting adventures in the coming year, predicts US flavour house, Comax Flavors, combinations that will energise and intrigue food, beverage and spirit developers alike. |
Recession and innovation – ten top tips
Food and drink businesses should focus on continuous improvement, over-invest in consumer insight and view innovation as accountable at a profit and loss level to help safeguard innovation in a recession. |
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The hybrid bakery boom has been spearheaded by the now famous cross-bred cronut, but the hype will soon settle and imitations will fall flat within a year, says Datamonitor Consumer.
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Health-conscious consumers are nuts about nuts, reports NPD
The recently released Harvard study on the health benefits of eating nuts just confirmed what health conscious-consumers already tell us, that nuts are good for you, reports The NPD Group, a leading global information company. |
Landor Associates predicts top 10 brand trends for 2014
In with the old and out with the new — the top brand trends of 2014 may surprise you. Social media becomes “old school” and the commitment to “second life” packaging intensifies. These are just some of the coming year’s predictions released by Landor Associates, the global strategic brand consulting and design firm. |
ICYMI: Innova’s top food-bev trends for 2014: waste reduction and regaining trust
The latest trends impacting the food industry include moves to reduce the huge amount of food waste, as consumers simultaneously adapt their habits in times of continuing austerity.
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Welcome to Dairy 2.0 Dairy innovation is taking a new direction. The last two decades have seen product developers focus on low/no-fat and on attempting to shoehorn into dairy products ingredients such as plant sterols, omega-3s and others, in order to offer medicalised benefits. But this period is over. The new direction is what some companies are calling “Dairy 2.0”, says New Nutrition Business.
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| Food Science, Technology and Ingredients |
New enzymes promise fresher packaged bread
Novozymes reports it has launched new enzyme technology that naturally secures significant freshness and texture improvements in packaged bread. |
Garlic kills contaminants in baby formula
Garlic may be bad for your breath, but it’s good for your baby, according to a new study from the University of British Columbia. |
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Umami — the meaty taste that the unfairly maligned MSG is designed to deliver — has seen a resurgence in the foodie community. Even famous chefs are using natural glutamates — which are not chemically different from the ones found in MSG — to enhance their food. MSG may be riding this wave back to respectability…
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| Health and Nutrition |
What grain is doing to your brain
It’s tempting to call David Perlmutter’s dietary advice radical. The neurologist and president of the Perlmutter Health Center in Naples, Florida, believes all carbs, including highly touted whole grains, are devastating to our brains. He claims we must make major changes in our eating habits as a society to ward off terrifying increases in Alzheimer’s disease and dementia rates. |
The Real Meal Revolution
Prof Tim Noakes is back in the news, with the recent launch of a co-authored book, essentially a cookbook, that outlines both the controversial high-fat-protein and no-carb dietary regime he now advocates and recipes to live it. It’s called The Real Meal Revolution, and is described by its publishers as “Part myth-busting scientific thriller, part mouth-watering cookbook”. |
Harvard study: Eating nuts may make you live longer
According to the largest study of its kind, people who ate a daily handful of nuts were 20 percent less likely to die from any cause over a 30-year period than those who didn’t consume nuts, say scientists from three Harvard-affiliated health institutions. |
ICYMI: ‘Superbugs could erase a century of medical advances,’ experts warn
Drug-resistant “superbugs” represent one of the gravest threats in the history of medicine, leading experts have warned. Routine operations could become deadly “in the very near future” as bacteria evolve to resist the drugs used to combat them. |
Can’t get children to eat greens? Blame it on the survival instinct
Researchers note that toddlers were far more reluctant to grasp plants than artificial items such as spoons or pipe cleaners – they believe this is because evolution has biologically programmed children to be wary of flora as it may contain potentially hazardous toxins |
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| Weird, Whacky and Wonderful Stuff |
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Robots will revolutionise the food industry It seems inevitable that the fast food and beverage industries will eventually be invaded by the same robotic and automation technologies that are already transforming manufacturing. If robots can be used to assemble precision electronics, then they can certainly also be used to produce hamburgers and lattes.
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‘Just brew it!’ Patented home brewing bag shakes up UK beer scene
Moonshine Drinks has launched a patented bag that allows drinkers to make 25 pints of beer simply by adding water amidst claims home brewing is the fastest growing hobby in the UK. |
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The headline may be rather dramatic, but this is an interesting take by Time magazine on some interesting food developments. Menu highlights: insect tacos, rice that stops blindness, noodles that can be “printed” in space, and hybrid confectioneries.
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Food bites…2013: On aseptics and sustainability…
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 “THE key is that, in the last five years in particular, consumers have fundamentally changed the way they look at food. When you look at consumer behaviour today, they look much more at the ingredient labels—and not just the Whole Foods shoppers, but also the Kroger shoppers and the Walmart shoppers. They like to know what’s in their food, and they care more about nutrients as well as taste. Aseptic plays directly into that. With aseptic, you can get as close as possible to fresh food, in terms of both nutrients and taste.
“It’s an interesting dynamic, however. At the same time as consumers want to be healthier, they have also become lazier about preparing food, or their lifestyles are too busy to allow them to take the time to prepare fresh food. Aseptic packaging provides them with a convenient option for shelf-stable, fresh foods.”
Michael Drozd, CEO of US aseptic processor and packager, Wright Foods
“[BUSINESSES] have to recognise that the needs of citizens and communities carry the same weight as the demands of shareholders. We believe that in future this will become the only acceptable model of business. If people feel that the system is unjust and does not work for them, they will rebel against it. And if we continue to consume key inputs like water, food, land and energy without thought as to their long-term sustainability, then none of us will prosper.”
Unilever CEO, Paul Polman
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