Food Standards Australia New Zealand has invited individuals and organisations with an interest in the regulation of food to provide information and comment on a number of possible changes to the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code. The changes under consideration include the approval of genetically modified (GM) maize, cotton and corn, erythrosine as a colouring for icing and a national food safety standard for the production and processing of raw milk products.

San Miguel Corp hopes to make the Cospak Group the vehicle for its Australasian and rapidly growing exports business following its acquisition of the company.

Cargill has announced that it has entered into an agreement to purchase Goodman Fielder’s Commercial Edible Fats and Oils business.

Convenient meal options are driving the demand for microwave packaging products with steady growth forecast for the next few years.

Retail ready packaging solutions have developed at a speedy rate and now the AIP is running a roadshow across Queensland and New South Wales in February to launch the new AFGC retail ready toolkit.

Taylors Eighty Acres wines from the Clare Valley, which are 100% carbon neutral based on the international standard for Life Cycle Assessmen, have been chosen for an official function during the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen.

A collection of new resources on European traditional foods has been released by The British Nutrition Foundation, on behalf of the European Food Information Resource (EuroFIR) project.

The safety of stay-tabs on beverage cans has been called into question after a US study has identified 19 cases of ingestion at a single hospital over a 16-year period.

The International Organisation for Standardisation has adopted a method developed by the European Commission's Joint Research Centre to measure vegetable fats in milk chocolate.

Barons Brewing has announced the acquisition of licensing and distribution for Australian beer company Outback Brewing. Under the agreement, Barons will control all global sales, marketing and distribution for the brand, making Outback Brewery the fourth licence acquisition for Barons this year.

Dr Owen Catchpole's work in the supercritical extraction of high-value extracts from biological products such as fish waste has been recognised with his being awarded the New Zealand Institute of Chemistry Fonterra Prize for Industrial and Applied Chemistry.

Natural lipid molecules found in soy, Sphingadienes, may underlie the benefits of all soy products. They have been found to possibly prevent and treat colon cancer.

Tetra Pak has an agreement with Braskem to purchase HDPE, derived from renewable feedstock, for use in a pilot project to produce 'green' caps and closures.

SSP Pumps has appointed Matrix Process Solutions as its sole Australian agent into industrial applications.

Symrise has created a Consumer Health unit which will develop a wide range of functional ingredients for modern food supplements and offer flavour solutions for health products.