Quantec has signed a distribution and supply agreement with Kanematsu Chemicals Corporation to distribute Quantec’s patented IDP complex of bioactive milk proteins throughout Japan. [ + ]

World demand for pharmaceutical packaging products will increase 6.4% annually to $90 billion in 2017, the Freedonia Group has predicted. [ + ]

What’s New in Food Technology & Manufacturing talked with Walter Mayer from Langen Packaging Group about the Langen Air Cartoner. [ + ]

Strawberry lovers rejoice: the days of unpacking your luscious berries from the refrigerator only to find them sprouting wispy goatees of mould may be numbered. [ + ]

The AFGC, Coles and the RED Group have launched the REDcycle Program in Canberra, which recycles soft plastic packaging into furniture. Consumers can drop off plastics at eight Coles stores in Canberra. [ + ]

Recent studies show people tend to eat twice as much of foods labelled sugar free, fat free or whole wheat due to what dieticians call the ‘health halo’ effect. Dietician Kari Kooi lists the top five ‘health’ foods to avoid. [ + ]

Don’t compared bottled water with tap water, the Australasian Bottled Water Institute has urged consumers. The institute has rejected recent media reports that bottled water is expensive and environmentally questionable. [ + ]

Avocado Oil New Zealand is using NZ’s only open-access product development spray dryer at Waikato Innovation Park to dry avocado pulp into a high-value powder to be marketed under the Avopure brand. [ + ]

Taylors Wines has won the Australia’s Best White Wine Bottle category for its Promised Land Moscato, which features applied ceramic labelling. [ + ]

According to researchers at the University of Sheffield, cold boiling is a more efficient way to dry products for food manufacture, using tiny, hot bubbles. [ + ]

Following Simplot’s announcement that its Bathurst cannery may close after the 2014 season, the AMWU has urged consumers, supermarkets and the government to take action to save Australia’s canned food industry. [ + ]

Arla Foods Ingredients has responded to the ‘acid whey’ controversy, claiming its processes do not produce the by-product.  [ + ]

Dairy processors can now test to verify the authenticity of claims that milk is organic. [ + ]

Wiley has won the AIB (Australian Institute of Building) Queensland Chapter’s Professional Excellence in Building State Award for Research, Development and Technology for its work on the Primo Smallgoods facility in Brisbane. [ + ]

While robots on banana farms may sound like a sci-fi movie plot, a University of Sydney robotics expert says this could be a reality in Australia within 10 years. [ + ]