ZESPRI EYES BIGGER SLICE OF JAPANESE MARKET 6 JUNE 2017 NEWS SNIPS Auckland-based Restaurant Brands New Zealand has boosted firstquarter sales by 67% to $161.2 million after the fastfood operator expanded into Australia, Hawaii, Guam and Saipan Frucor Beverage's long-running battle with the Inland Revenue Department over the use of convertible notes more than a decade ago is set to hit the courtroom in 2018 My Food Bag has moved to a new site in Parnell due to the success of convenient delivery of quality ingredients for Kiwis to prepare varied meals, with a whole floor dedicated to its development kitchen Dr Phil Rolston, a scientist in herbage and vegetable seed research, has won a KEA New Zealand award for work in addressing global poverty through his scientific discovery of methods for growing crops in arid areas PASIFIKA FARE ON AUCKLAND MENU Auckland now has its first 65-seat Pasifika restaurant, thanks to television cuisine host and author Robert Oliver. Kai Pasifika in Mt Eden will offer an array of pan-pacific dishes from Samoa, Tonga, the Cook Islands, Fiji and Vanuatu, using mostly organic ingredients sourced from the islands. “Pacific cuisine has suffered from a lot of misconceptions,” Oliver says. “Misinformed stereotyping has tended to portray Pacific Island food differently from the pristineness that is its true character. All Pacific cuisine uses fresh ingredients that are organic, for the most part, and use little oil in the cooking process. This allows for the natural flavour of each ingredient to speak for itself.” Much of the fish, spices and chutneys come in from Fiji, the cocoa and taro are from Samoa, and the coconuts and coconut products are from several islands, he says. Calling the restaurant a “five year dream,” Oliver says his failed online crowd funding route last year did not deter his business partners Richard Hall and Kenina Court, and the enterprise’s opening was assisted by Auckland real estate business owner Repeka Leaulu. As well as promoting Pacific cuisines through a series of popular television shows aired in many parts of the world, Oliver has helped promote organic growing and healthy eating in countries like Samoa through ‘farm to plate’ programmes, where organic farmers directly supply to the hospitality industry under the aegis of NGOs. N E W S Zespri is planning to grow sales of premium Zespri kiwifruit in Japan by 25% over the next five years, after achieving 30% increases in the past two seasons. Chief executive Lain Jager says Zespri sold a record 24 million trays of kiwifruit in Japan last season, worth $500m million and accounting for 16% of global sales. “This is all the more remarkable as overall fruit sales in Japan declined by almost 10% over the past decade, against the backdrop of an economy with an ageing population and changing consumer behaviour with a growing preference for more convenient processed products,” Jager says. Last year saw Zespri’s Japan marketing become more product-centric, and a new commercial model will see the aggregation of larger land areas with significant volume growth ahead in response to the exceptional success and demand for SunGold in the Japanese market. TEGEL TAKES TOP HONOURS Leading poultry producer Tegel has been named 2017 supply partner of the year across Australia and New Zealand at the Subway Brand supplier awards. Tegel started its supplier relationship with Subway when the brand opened its first Kiwi store in 1994, and in 2008 extended its supply to stores across the ditch. Subway director Australia and New Zealand Lesley Dobson says Tegel are “fantastic collaborative partners, who have helped us launch great products that our customers love.” Tegel manufactures and supplies Subway with a range of products including sliced turkey, chicken breast strips, three pepper schnitzel, chicken classic and chicken schnitzel. SIGN UP FOR YOUR FREE DIGITAL SUBSCRIPTION www.foodtechnology.co.nz WE’RE DRINKING IT HERE Kiwis are among the first consumers to taste Coca-Cola’s new Coke No Sugar drink that has taken five years of research, recipe mixing and flavour trials to taste as similar to the original classic product as possible. The company revealed the new offering at a central Auckland event, and says it will be available in the middle of this month. “We wanted the experience of drinking Coke No Sugar to be as close as possible to the ‘real thing’,” the company’s Oceania manager Sandhya Pillay says. “That’s no small task when you consider the original taste is so well-known and has been around for over 130 years. Faced with this challenge, our team of taste experts spent five years mixing different flavours and conducting 18 separate consumer trials before finally cracking it.” The global rollout of Coke No Sugar will be the biggest launch of a new Coca-Cola since Coke Zero’s 2006 introduction, with New Zealand one of the first countries to try it. “People are looking for a better balance in their diet and lifestyle, which is why we are changing the way we do things at Coca-Cola,” Pillay says. “This is about our business making the leap from simply offering people more choice to actively encouraging people to drink a ‘no sugar’ option.” Around 200,000 Coke No Sugar samples will be given
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