Success Stories

Demand surges as KiwiHarvest celebrates a decade of doing good

New Zealand’s largest food rescue organisation, KiwiHarvest, is celebrating 10 years of operation this year, having distributed 7.5 million kgs of food to communities in need (the equivalent to 21.6 million meals) and diverted 20 million kgs C02-equivalent from landfill, since its inception. Across its five branches, it has 276 active food donors, and services 227 recipient organisations, providing food support to over 33,500 individuals per week. Achieving that level of scale and substance has been no easy task. KiwiHarvest was established in Dunedin in 2012, initially as FoodShare by Deborah Manning, when she was inspired by two articles in her local newspaper – one about dumpster diving and the other about food insecurity. “I’m profoundly grateful to everyone who has joined our journey over the last ten years. Our story shows what can be achieved when people share a common goal. We can make people’s lives shine a bit brighter through the power and mana of nutritious kai and treating and respecting our land as taonga,” says Manning. The demand for KiwiHarvest’s services has grown exponentially due to the pandemic. In the past 24 months alone, KiwiHarvest rescued 3.9 million kgs of food, nearly half (47%) of its total 10 year volume. Gavin Findlay, KiwiHarvest CEO, says, “At the start of each lockdown, many food businesses chose to donate food that could no longer be sold. Donations from events companies, caterers and retail organisations provided much-needed support to those struggling in the wake of the pandemic. “Although we saw an increase of food donations in 2020, this has since declined due to supply chain issues and less food in circulation. The demand from our recipient agencies, however, also continues to increase, and we still have a waiting list of organisations wishing to become a recipient. There are still areas […]

FlipFarm Systems takes top innovation award at Global Seafood Alliance Awards

A New Zealand company has been recognised for being a leader in oyster farm technology, picking up the 2021 Global Aquaculture Innovation Award at the Global Seafood Alliance Awards. The Award, which was handed to FlipFarm Systems at a virtual event earlier this month, recognises individuals and companies finding new solutions to the key challenges facing aquaculture. FlipFarm Systems, designed and developed by the owners of Marlborough Oysters, bet out 39 applicants from 24 countries to secure a place as a finalist, before being voted the overall winner by audience vote. FlipFarm Systems is a semi-automated oyster growing system that helps provide an ideal environment for oyster growth, conditioning and hardening, while giving complete control over fouling, pests and predators. FlipFarm Managing Director Aaron Pannell and Owner/Operator of Marlborough Oysters is delighted with the win, which further cements the company on the international stage. “Our FlipFarm technology officially launched two years ago and is used by more than 70 oyster farmers in 12 countries worldwide,” says Pannell, who runs the business with his wife, Debbie. “While carrying out the day-to-day operations at our oyster farming business, Marlborough Oysters, we identified the need for improved technology. We needed to evolve the growing process from the traditional system of plastic oyster growing bags clipped to growing lines with webbing lanyards.” The former system proved ineffective and the equipment would wear out and during stormy weather they would lose hundreds of oyster growing bags. This not only impacted their bottom line, and negatively impacted the environment, but meant staff were regularly called on to make repairs and retrieve lost equipment. Aaron knew there must be a better way, so he applied his can-do attitude and marine farming experience to design FlipFarm – harvesting equipment which would bring a new level of efficiency to […]

Nelson manufacturer wins Supplier of the Year award for 3rd Year Running

A Nelson-based contract manufacturer for products made from high-quality natural ingredients has for the third year running won the Supplier of the Year Award for New Zealand’s natural health products industry. Industry body Natural Health Products NZ recently announced Alaron Products as the 2021 winner. The award, which was decided by popular vote among Natural Health Products NZ’s members, recognises a supplier that has made a significant contribution to businesses within the sector. Natural Health Products NZ’s General Manager Kerry Warn says Alaron Products has developed an excellent reputation during nearly 30 years of custom manufacturing nutraceutical products. “Alaron has a high standard for quality control, and continuously strives for success and supports clients to deliver premium quality products to worldwide consumers. They have developed a reputation for providing exemplary customer service and high-quality products. “Alaron’s ongoing success in our Supplier of the Year this event shows the extent to which they get it right on every level.” Alaron’s General Manager Business Development Claire Quin says the third consecutive win is a very proud moment for the company. “Everything we do is with our customers in mind and the fact that our customers recognise our team’s efforts is truly rewarding. “Our team is focused on meeting customers’ needs and it takes a big effort from all aspects of our supply chain to make that happen.”

Fonterra and Vitakey to enhance dairy’s contribution to health and wellness

Looking to a future where it is likely that many foods will be more valued for their specific health benefits, Fonterra and VitaKey Inc. has announced a transformative dairy science collaboration to further unlock the benefits of Fonterra’s probiotic strains. VitaKey specialises in precision delivery of nutrition – an emerging area of research that seeks to deliver the right nutrients, in the right amount, to the right part of the body at the right time. Co-founded by Dr. Robert Langer, the VitaKey delivery technology platform for nutrients is based on technology licensed from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and developed at the Langer Lab, the largest academic biomedical engineering lab in the world. Utilising VitaKey’s proprietary technology and customised solutions, Fonterra is looking to design dairy products that incorporate targeted and time-controlled release of specific dairy nutrients, starting with probiotics, in a way that locks in the freshness for longer and allows the nutrients to be more active and beneficial in the body. Judith Swales, CEO for Fonterra’s Asia Pacific region, says the collaboration is part of Fonterra’s long-term strategy and ambition to be a leader in dairy innovation and nutrition science. “Our Co-op has a long and proud heritage of dairy innovation, pioneering many world firsts and, increasingly, new solutions which aim to help people live healthier and longer lives. “Home to one of the largest dairy culture libraries in the world, our Research and Development Centre contains more than 40,000 strains. Two of these strains, LactoB 001 and BifidoB 019, address key health concerns such as digestive issues and immunity and are recognised as being in the top five global probiotics. “By partnering with VitaKey, we aim to ‘make nature better’ by combining the goodness of our New Zealand milk with […]

Scholarship gives young people boost into beekeeping career

Young people interested in a beekeeping career are being encouraged to apply for the annual Ron Mossop Youth Scholarship, sponsored by Mossop’s Honey and Apiculture New Zealand. The scholarship was set up three years ago as a way of giving young people the best possible start in the apiculture industry. The scholarship includes $2000 to be put towards best practice training and/or set up costs. It also includes membership of industry body Apiculture New Zealand for a year and attendance at the industry’s national conference in the year of the award. Last year’s recipient, Bay of Plenty 18-year-old Angus Brenton-Rule, says the scholarship provided valuable support in his first year of beekeeping. As well as allowing him to buy resources to kick-start his career, Angus welcomed the opportunity to make connections with the wider industry through his membership of Apiculture New Zealand and his attendance at their June conference. “Conference was a really great opportunity to meet other beekeepers and hear about what’s happening in other parts of the country. I learnt lots.” Angus has spent the last year working for Whakatane-based Golden Grove Apiaries says the experience has him enthused about a future in the industry. “It’s such a fun and interesting job. I definitely see it as something I want to do long-term.” Angus advises other young beekeepers or young people interested in a career in apiculture to apply for the scholarship. “It’s so worth it and you’ll never know unless you try. If you win, you’ll be glad you applied,” he says. The scholarship is named after industry pioneer, Ron Mossop, who started his family beekeeping businesses in the 1940s. His business was built on values of quality and integrity, which remain at the heart of Mossop’s Honey today. Neil Mossop said his family were thrilled to […]

Picking the way to a better asparagus future with robotic harvesting

A robotic asparagus harvester project led by growers and supported by the Government is set to reinvigorate the New Zealand asparagus industry, by alleviating ongoing labour challenges. The New Zealand Asparagus Council (NZAC) and Tauranga-based Robotics Plus will work alongside New Zealand asparagus growers to develop a world-first commercial-scale autonomous robotic asparagus harvester to help address ongoing labour shortages in the industry and support growers to tap into high-value export markets. The Government’s Sustainable Food and Fibre Futures (SFF Futures) fund is contributing $2.6 million to the $5.83 million project. “We’re really excited to get this project underway as we simply don’t have enough people to do the work,” says Mangaweka Asparagus grower and NZAC Chair, Sam Rainey. “Robotic harvesting will be a game-changer for the asparagus industry that currently relies heavily on picking asparagus by hand, which is hard toil. An average picker will walk 10 kilometres per day, so it’s extremely difficult to attract people to do the work. “Having the ability to access a commercial robotic harvester will also go a long way to helping manage costs, ensuring we can continue to put locally grown fresh asparagus on our plates.” Steve Saunders, CEO of Robotics Plus, says an autonomous asparagus harvester will alleviate labour constraints, reduce and stabilise costs, and allow New Zealand asparagus to have a more competitive offering in high-value export markets. “We’re excited to be working with growers and the New Zealand Asparagus Council to ensure we develop a solution that tackles challenges head-on and creates a better future for the asparagus industry. It’s an ideal robotics project as green asparagus is conducive to automation as it grows above ground. In addition, it replaces a physically arduous job that only has a brief employment window that growers struggle to attract harvesting labour for,” says […]

Fooditive’s sweetener a revolution in the food industry?

The words ‘healthy’ and ‘natural’ are not often linked to sugar substitutes, but Fooditive BV wants to change that. Over the past decade, the Netherlands-based food ingredient manufacturer has been pear-suing sustain-apple solutions to combat global sugar intake. In 2018, this became a reality with its plant-based and chemical-free sweetener. Since then, Fooditive has focussed on improving the health status of products that use sugar replacements by providing an affordable alternative to other options on the market. As put by Fooditive’s Product Development Manager, Niki Karatza, “developing a sweetener that could successfully replace sugar in food products required us to first understand the true essence of sugar. We managed that by diving into the science behind sucrose, its taste and its unique functionalities.” This was achieved through an innovative process: the reverse engineering of sucrose. By starting with the end product and working backwards, it allowed Fooditive to analyse the ingredients’ properties and therefore understand how it could mimic the characteristics of sugar in its sweetener. Combining this knowledge with apple and pear waste led to the creation of Fooditive Sweetener, which is 70% as sweet as sugar and does not raise insulin or blood glucose levels. With sustainability and transitioning to a circular economy as Fooditive’s core principles, it obtains the raw materials for its sweetener in two ways. Firstly, it collaborates with Dutch farmers to salvage both organic and non-organic unwanted apples and pears, and secondly, it collects the side streams of these fruits from other production processes. Once gathered, a continuous fermentation process, which means that more sweetener can be yielded in a shorter amount of time, is used to extract fructose and convert it into keto-fructose; this end product is the sweetener. For 2021, founder and food scientist Moayad Abushokhedim has set a weekly goal to produce around 30 […]

Alamir Bakery authentic Lebanese food manufacturer

Alamir bakery is a family owned business in Miramar which has been making authentic Lebanese food since it started out in 1992. The company distributes its hummus, falafel bites, pita bread and chips to supermarkets, restaurants and cafes throughout the country. Commentary from Ali Dia – Managing Director of Alamir Bakery Our parents Jamil and Waafa immigrated to Wellington from Lebanon in 1990 due to the war. I was just 8 months old and at that time my brother would have been two years old. My other two brothers were born in NZ. When my parents first arrived my dad had heaps of different jobs – at one stage he was a driver for the Iranian Embassy and my mother ended up becoming the caterer for the embassy because my father invited some people from the embassy to come for a meal at our house one day and they fell in love with my mother’s hummus and they asked mum to cater all the meetings for 1.5 years. My parents started the business after they were encouraged by the founder of Mexican Corn Chips (who is also Lebanese) to sell our hummus to supermarkets. Our parents started the business in 1992, making small batches of hummus and falafel in a little commercial kitchen at the back of our house in Miramar, Wellington. At this point the “Alamir” name wasn’t born yet – we were still trading as ‘The Delicious Lebanese Snack Co Ltd’, distributing to local Supermarkets, Restaurants and cafes. Slowly the product range grew and our father (and let’s be honest, our mother!) began thinking about how else can we spread our natural-and-full-of-flavour “super food” to everyone! In 2001 we opened ‘Alamir Bakery’ and started making traditional Lebanese Pita Bread and all types of Lebanese food; from kebby to […]

The Interview:James Crow, Little Island

We want to command a dominant export position, as NZ animal protein business have done in the past. How do you see current business opportunities for your company? This is new territory for us all but what the past two months have reaffirmed is that the need for locally manufactured food with environmental credentials is only growing. Consumers have become more aware of what they are consuming over the lockdown and will be more receptive to the health and lifestyle benefits that plant based foods can offer. As our hospitality channels rebuild, we will look to develop specific products and formats for that industry as well. Our current capital raise via Snowball Effect will allow us to react more quickly to these developing trends to expand our current range, while also acquiring a plant based yoghurt business to round out our offering. Do you export and to where? We have tested the waters with exports into an independent Australian retailer chain of 100 stores and a successful two year pilot in a premium Singapore supermarket chain of 45 stores. This work has shown where the opportunities are and the work that will be required to secure these regions for Little Island in the future. After 10 years, is everything on track? For a start-up “on track” is generally code for you tackled the last obstacle and are charging ahead. The secret to our success so far has been building production capacity and knowledge in what we do, from the ground up, and this is going well. We have very good business fundamentals that now require further capital to accelerate growth. Through our current capital raise we have a solid strategy to develop our people and products to become the dominant plant based business both in New Zealand and in our […]

Aptean launches new food and beverage ERP partner program

Aptean, a global provider of mission-critical enterprise software solutions, announced the launch of a new, global partner program designed to expand the company’s geographic reach for its Aptean Food and Beverage ERP solutions with world-class channel sellers. The partner program extends Aptean’s Microsoft Dynamics 365 platform offerings for Business Central, Finance and Supply Chain Management in select European, Middle Eastern and African (EMEA) countries, as well as in the Latin American (LATAM) and Asian Pacific (APAC) markets. As food and beverage organisations around the world continue scaling their businesses to keep up with consumer demand, their need for best-in-class enterprise resource planning technology becomes critical to finding success in today’s unpredictable economic landscape. To navigate margin pressures, improve traceability and quickly adapt to changes in the supply chain, these businesses need specialised software designed for their industries, as well as regional customer support resources that operate in local time zones and languages. “Aptean’s Food and Beverage ERP Partner Program recognises those who have proven to be trusted advisors to their clients and are committed to the food and beverage industry. Additionally, our partners are uniquely positioned to provide the highest quality of service, technology and expertise to ensure customers achieve success with our unified ERP system,” said Bob Kocis, Chief Revenue Officer at Aptean. Launching with Velosio, iPlan Global, Notora, Olivia Sistemas S.L. and Rödl & Partner as charter members, this program will enable Aptean to support, recognise and reward its approved partners as they provide sales and support for software both in the cloud and on-premise. “Our partnership with Aptean has strengthened our ability to meet the evolving requirements of food and beverage organisations. Together, we provide the ability to operate more effectively by enhancing visibility and creating more efficient, profitable business practices. Our team is looking forward to gaining […]

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