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Nestlé is rebranding KitKats as “YouTube Break” for a limited run of 600,000 bars in the UK.
The Google-branded chocolate bars are the first of a series of 100 million differently-branded biscuits that will be produced as part of a new Nestlé campaign.
Nestlé has run tie-ups with Google before. The company, which tends to name its mobile operating systems after desserts or sweet snacks, named Android 4.4 “KitKat” as part of a branding deal.
Alongside the change of name, YouTube will be launching new playlists meant to allow biscuit-eaters to best enjoy their breaks. Searching “KitKat YouTube my break” on Android phones will bring up a special set of the top four trending YouTube videos.
Nestlé is also stamping chocolate bars with a special hashtag and wrappers that suggest different kinds of breaks, including “me time break” and “sporty break”.
The tie-up is part of Nestlé’s celebration of KitKat’s 80th birthday, and YouTube’s 10th, the chocolate bar company said.
Arsenal stars Mathieu Debuchy and Wojciech Szczesny have posted a picture of themselves braving some infamous durian fruit.
The photo of the footballers, posted on Debuchy’s Instagram account Thursday (14 May), doubled up as a way of promoting the club’s upcoming tour to Singapore, where the fruit – renowned for its potent smell – is popular.
In a separate story involving the same fruit, two Jersey firefighters crews and a Jersey Gas representative responded quickly to an alert about a potential gas leak at a block of flats.
The property was searched, but no gas leak was found, with the crews realising that the gas-like stench was coming from some durian fruit belonging to the residents.
Blakemore Fresh Foods has said its turnover reached a new high of £39 million for the 2014/15 financial year, an increase of £3 million on the year before, after it secured 40 new clients and opened a new office in Bristol at the start of this year.
The growth comes after a period of substantial investment for the fresh meat wholesaler and importer, which has opened three other new offices and a £3.5 million cutting and storage facility over the past five years.
Trading director, Richard Brownjohn, said the company had big ambitions for further growth: “It is our ambition to be recognised as one of the top five meat importers and wholesalers in the UK, and the contribution of those within our new offices, in addition to the existing expertise that we have across our operation, will be vital towards us achieving this goal.”
Company claims unique design minimises machine loading and operational requirements
Post-harvest equipment manufacturer Wyma has unveiled its new Bin and Bag Tipper, designed to gently tip heavy loads of fresh produce into bags, bins or boxes.
This new addition to Wyma’s product range was originally designed for a large potato chip processor who wanted a versatile tipper that would minimise labour input and maximise safety.
“The ability to quickly change between bin and bag operations minimises machine loading and operational requirements,” the company said in a statement. “Another key feature contributing to its low operational requirement is the ability to secure the bags from the front, without having to reach out at the back of the bin tipper to place the retaining hooks on the back loops.”
The Bin and Bag Tipper also eliminates the need for additional tippers or in-feed points, which Wyma claims reduces overhead costs and the environmental footprint of any given packhouse.
Company claims unique design minimises machine loading and operational requirements
Post-harvest equipment manufacturer Wyma has unveiled its new Bin and Bag Tipper, designed to gently tip heavy loads of fresh produce into bags, bins or boxes.
This new addition to Wyma’s product range was originally designed for a large potato chip processor who wanted a versatile tipper that would minimise labour input and maximise safety.
“The ability to quickly change between bin and bag operations minimises machine loading and operational requirements,” the company said in a statement. “Another key feature contributing to its low operational requirement is the ability to secure the bags from the front, without having to reach out at the back of the bin tipper to place the retaining hooks on the back loops.”
The Bin and Bag Tipper also eliminates the need for additional tippers or in-feed points, which Wyma claims reduces overhead costs and the environmental footprint of any given packhouse.
The Royal Welsh Agricultural Society (RWAS) Spring Festival in Builth Wells next weekend will host a series of short seminars with the heading ‘Profiting from Pigs’.
The new website will go live in the summer and will include an introduction to Welsh pork production, a directory of pig producers and case studies.
“This new website will form part of our plans to increase awareness of pork suppliers in Wales and the quality of their products,” said Melanie Hughes, HCC’s market development officer. “It will offer producers an opportunity to build their online presence and will be a starting point for customers who are looking to source locally produced pork.
“During the Spring Festival, we will be introducing the website to the industry and recruiting interested producers for the directory.”
Other HCC activities during the weekend will include a programme of seminars, delivered in partnership with Farming Connect and the RWAS. Also held in the pig shed, these sessions will be suitable for large and small-scale producers and will cover topics including pig health, artificial insemination and adding value through direct sales.
Luned Evans, HCC’s industry development officer, said: “The seminars are free to attend and will be an interesting source of information for anyone keen to learn about rearing pigs. Speakers with specialist knowledge of the sector have been invited and will be happy to share their expert advice.”
The Spring Festival will take place on 16 and 17 May at the Royal Welsh Showground.
In the UK since 1980, ice cream prices have fallen by 50 per cent, while fruit and vegetables have gone up by 199 per cent, ODI claims
British-based think tank the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) has recommended that emerging economy governments consider introducing taxes and subsidies to offset wildly differing price changes in junk food and healthy food.
People in newly-rich countries struggle to eat a healthy diet because some common processed foods like cakes and biscuits have become cheaper, while at the same time, the prices of fruit and vegetables have gone up, the ODI argues.
The ODI study, ‘The rising cost of a healthy diet’ which looked at relative food retail prices in Brazil, China, Korea and Mexico – the first of its kind in emerging economies – found that fruit and vegetables rose in price by up to 91 per cent between 1990 and 2012, a price hike higher than other any other food group. On the other hand, some processed foods, like ready meals, dropped in price by up to 20 per cent.
Report findings include: 
– In Mexico, where almost 70 per cent of adults are overweight and obese, ready meals have become cheaper and the cost of green vegetables has increased since 1990.
– In Brazil, where the prevalence of overweight and obese adults has doubled since 1980, crisps, biscuits, energy bars and sugary drinks formulated to be ‘hyper-palatable’ are much more widely eaten than previously.
– In China green vegetables have become twice as expensive over the last 20 years.
– In South Korea, the price of cabbage, a common ingredient of traditional dishes such as kimchi, has risen by 60 per cent.
– In the UK since 1980, ice cream prices have fallen by 50 per cent, while fruit and vegetables have gone up by 199 per cent.
ODI researcher and report co-author, Steve Wiggins, said: “In Brazil, the consumption of ‘ultra-processed’ ready-to-eat food has risen from 80kg per person per year in 1999 to around 110kg per person per year by 2013. Using the weight of the food as a measure, this is equivalent to each person eating an extra 140 Big Macs a year.”
The report’s authors said the rising cost of fruit and vegetables may be due – in part – to cutting-edge technologies that result in higher-quality vegetables that are cut, trimmed, bagged and washed, and available all year round.
Advances in food manufacturing and falling costs of transport and logistics could explain the drop in prices of some processed foods such as noodles, ice cream, crisps and cookies.
Wiggins added: “In January 2014, in an attempt to curb obesity, Mexico introduced taxes on sugary drinks and energy-dense food. Everyone is watching to see what effects these taxes have, as policy-makers in rich and poor countries struggle to respond to the looming health epidemic caused by changing diets.”
The report recommends that emerging economy governments consider introducing taxes and subsidies to offset these price changes.
Wiggins said: “Research in the UK in 2009 predicted that imposing a VAT-style 17.5 per cent tax on less healthy food and using the proceeds to subsidise fruit and vegetables would save between 3,600 and 6,400 premature deaths a year from diet-related disease.
“Even the lower estimate (3,600) is more than twice as many as the amount of people that die on the roads in the UK and a huge effort is put into road safety.”
Sales of fresh meat and poultry have dropped in both value and volume over the 12 weeks to 26 April 2015.
According to the Kantar Worldpanel’s Meat, Fish & Poultry Market Update, fresh primary meat and poultry value sales dropped by 4.3% compared to the same period in 2014, while volume sales fell by 1.1%.
Turkey was the worst-affected, seeing a 13.5% drop in volume sales and a 7.3% drop in value sales, followed by pork which saw a 12.1% in value and a 7% drop in volume.
Value sales of chicken fell by 4.2% but grew 0.3% in volume.
Lamb saw a surge in volume sales in the period due to Easter, increasing by 3.6%. However, promotional activity meant that value sales fell by 2.4% year-on-year.
On the processed side, the good weather in spring helped boost volume sales of burgers and grills by 13.3%, with value sales rising by 15.3%, which in turn grew the overall fresh processed meat and poultry sector sales by 1.6% in value and 3.1% in terms of volume.
An increase in price cut promotions in processed poultry has also led to “significant growth” of 7% value sales and 8.6% volume sales.
Pat O’Doherty, of O’Doherty’s Fine Meats, from Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh, has developed a pork pie with truffles and mushrooms, and a pork pie with a herb pastry base, to coincide with the Oscar Wilde Festival, which will take place in the same town.
Wilde attended Portora Royal School in Enniskillen before studying at Trinity College in Dublin and Oxford University.
O’Doherty said: “The pig has long been the most important animal in rural communities like Fermanagh and it made sense to create new pork pie flavours to give visitors to Enniskillen an opportunity to enjoy pies with a difference as part of the tourism experience. Pigs were the mainstay of family farms for generations throughout Fermanagh.
“Oscar Wilde would certainly have enjoyed pork in pies and other dishes during his seven years at Portora Royal School. The pies can be eaten hot or cold and provide a tasty treat for visitors to Enniskillen.
”O’Doherty’s Fine Meats is a family-run business, which has provided meat to Enniskillen since the 1940s, and is the pioneer of the award-winning Fermanagh Black Bacon.
Invest Northern Ireland said the launch of the new pies was a further sign of the convergence under way in Northern Ireland between tourism and local food, with O’Doherty also behind the country’s only Black Pudding festival.