News

The 4th World Cocoa Conference was held from 22 to 25 April 2018 in Berlin/Germany. SG SP

The Hamburg-based food ingredients specialist Bösch Boden Spies is expanding its Management Board. SP

Buderim Group Ltd has completed the acquisition of Royal Hawaiian Orchards™, the macadamia nut brand by Royal Hawaiian Macadamia Nut, Inc. (RHO, LP), and merged it with retail macadamia nut brand, MacFarms. SG SP

Confectionery sellers in German retail started 2018 with a slight decline in revenues. According to IRI’s confectionery monitor, revenues sank by 0.5% to € 1.882 bn in the first two months with an even stronger decline in sales volume of 2.7% to 257,062 tonnes (basis: food retailers + drug stores + hard discounters + gas station shops). SG

To meet growing consumer demand, Mondelez International has inaugu­rated its newest "Factory of the Future", a state-of-the-art biscuit manufacturing plant in the Kingdom of Bahrain. SG

Nestlé has reported three-month sales for 2018. Organic growth reached 2.8%, and was within the company`s guided range for 2018. Excluding the U.S. confectionery business, organic growth was 2.9%. SG

The Malaysian company PureCircle has reported that the use of stevia leaf sweetener in food products and beverages continues to expand. SP

Sonoco, one of the largest diversified global packaging companies, announced the start of Robert C. Tiede’s tenure as the new President and CEO of Sonoco. SP

Claudia Pedretti-Lenz will join Barry Callebaut as Head Investor Relations effective July 1, 2018, coming from J. Stern & Co (Switzerland) AG where she led the opening of their new branch in Zurich. SG SP

In the first six months of fiscal year 2017/18 (ended February 28, 2018), the Barry Callebaut Group grew its sales volume by 8.0% to 1.023 m tonnes. SG SP

Nestlé today unveiled KitKat Ruby to chocolate lovers in Europe and Germany after its successful debut in Japan and Korea in January this year. KitKat Ruby offers consumers a new way of savouring chocolate. SG SP

Thorsten Kühn has been appointed the new Chief Executive Officer of the Schur Flexibles Group, a company based in Wiener Neudorf/Austria specialising in packaging solutions for the food, tobacco and pharmaceutical industries. SG SP

The Italian family-owned company group Ferrero has announced that its revenue rose 1.5% in the fiscal year 2016/17 (ended August 2017) to € 10.5 bn, as sales growth in foreign markets compensated for a flat performance in Italy. SG

Jan Kolanski, founder and owner of the most innovative Polish confectioner Colian, is the first Polish entrepreneur to win the prestigious award. He was honoured to receive the European Candy Kettle Award 2017 in Warsaw. SG

The Hershey Company has announced it has created a new sustainable cocoa programme called “Cocoa For Good”, and the company will invest up to USD 500 m by 2030 to help support the programme. SG