Magnavale, one of the UK’s leading providers of temperature-controlled storage, has recently announced it has expanded its service offering at its Easton facility to encompass blast freezing solutions.

Magnavale currently offers blast freezing at its facilities in Chesterfield, Scunthorpe, Warrington and now Easton. The provider of temperature-controlled storage believes that the addition of the service, on top of its frozen storage solutions, will create opportunities for its current customers to improve their supply chain efficiency and reduce overall costs.

Magnavale has been providing blast freezing solutions for over 20 years and has one of the largest blast freezing capacities in the UK. Aiming to decrease food waste, while increasing supply chain efficiencies, Magnavale are improving national cold supply chains with its expanded service offering.

In September 2022, Magnavale acquired the 44,000-pallet cold storage facility known as Magnavale Easton with the promise to invest in the infrastructure as well as the on-site services. Approximately four months on, Magnavale has demonstrated its commitment to the facility, announcing that the construction of Phase 2 of the development has been initiated coupled with the enhancement of on-site services.

Magnavale, one of the UK’s leading providers of temperature-controlled storage, has recently announced it has expanded its value-added services to include a fully automated tray washing facility available with capabilities for nationwide food manufacturers and retailers.

Magnavale Chesterfield currently has one of the largest portfolios of cold chain solutions in the industry including tray washing facilities have now been significantly upgraded with the introduction of an automated tray wash facility.

The cold storage operator explains that the newly installed tray washing equipment at the Chesterfield facility has several steps to its cleaning process whereby the tray is first rinsed, clearing off any residue with a multitude of high-pressure jets, followed by a second step where the tray is chemically serialised to the highest standard with food safety chemicals which are fully compliant with retailer standards.

Magnavale believes the investment in the automated equipment is extremely beneficial to current customers as well as new customers, eliminating the need for food manufacturers to clean and store trays. As with many services that Magnavale offers, the tray washing solution is carried out 24/7 and the supplier of cold storage and added value services is taking immediate bookings.

Social enterprise asks businesses to unlock surplus stock to support more people and communities across the country.

Award-winning social enterprise, Community Shop, has urged the food and drink industry to maximise the value from its surplus stock, as it today reveals a doubling in demand for its services.

With more families than ever having to make the very real choice between a warm home and a warm meal, Community Shop served a record 45,808 baskets*, resulting in a 104% increase in demand for its services over the festive period (1^st – 31^st December 2022).

Community Shop operates 10 social supermarket stores across the UK, all of which are in areas of high deprivation and are open to people receiving welfare support. It works with the FMCG industry to redistribute surplus stock that might have otherwise gone to waste, enabling its members to access high-quality, low-cost food and essential products.

The surplus stock donated by the industry also helps to power each of Community Shop’s Kitchens, where members can access homemade wholesome meals, and learning and development Hubs. The Hubs deliver transformative personal development training, including programmes that support health, wellbeing and money matters, to increase members’ confidence, build on strengths and overcome barriers in their lives. All of this provides a critical lifeline to thousands of families on the cusp of food poverty, which is more needed than ever before in today’s economic climate.

With recent analysis from the Resolution Foundation suggesting that the average UK household is only half-way through the cost of living crisis with incomes set to fall further, Community Shop is predicting further significant increases in demand for its services in 2023.

To meet this growing demand for support, Community Shop has already announced its next store will open in a few weeks’ time, and is now asking for more businesses to review their supply chains to identify and unlock surplus stock that can be used to create significant positive impact for people and communities across the country.

Owen McLellan, Company Shop Group’s Managing Director, said:

“The redistribution of surplus stock makes a critical difference to families in the UK who rely on it being available to help their stretched budgets go further. Through the support of our partners, we were able to provide thousands of meals to adults and children, as well as activities and gifts, that helped maintain the magic of Christmas.

“With the right intervention surplus stock can be fuel for change and in Community Shop we provide a powerful combination of much-needed relief from food poverty, and access to life changing learning and development programmes.

“We’ll continue to see a growing need for this support and that’s why we’re today asking the industry to work with us to identify opportunities to redistribute surplus products – which may otherwise be seen and treated as waste – so that we can continue supporting those that need it the most.”

Community Shop is part of Company Shop Group, the UK’s leading redistributor of surplus food and non-food products. Companies looking to unlock the value from their surplus stock can get in touch at surplus@companyshop.co.uk

The Big Prawn Co Limited is a UK based business that specialises in the manufacture of prawns and shellfish to the retail and foodservice sectors.

Sykes Seafood is a UK based, privately-owned company, focused on providing customers with sustainably sourced quality seafood.

Together with Sykes Seafood, Klaas Puul and Ruskim creates a $550m pan European shrimp focussed seafood business that will offer a market-leading offering of seafood products across the Retail, Wholesale, Industry and Foodservice sectors. The combined businesses will operate 6 manufacturing sites across the UK, Europe, and Morocco as well as 10 distribution centres across UK and Europe employing over 4000 colleagues.

The Sykes and The Big Prawn Co business already share many synergies and similarities, and the combination will provide a solid backdrop for future growth and allow greater efficiencies in sourcing and an enhanced delivery platform to customers old and new.

Alan Dale, Group CEO at Sykes Seafood said:

“Big Prawn is a business we have long admired with its strong management team, efficient production facilities and an innovative approach to product development. This is supported by strong company brands and sourcing offering a broad, quality focussed and sustainable product range to its customers.

Our focus will be to invest in increased capacity in the factory and build on its strong relationships with its customer and supplier base”

BFFF chief executive Rupert Ashby and President Ian Stone had a productive meeting with DEFRA officials. Mr Ashby and Mr Stone took the opportunity to raise key issues facing BFFF members directly with with the government, including fuel and energy costs, food waste, labour shortages, the government’s Obesity Strategy and the 2023 cold water shrimp quota.

Mr Ashby commented: “I was delighted to meet with officials as part of the BFFF’s ongoing work in Westminster to raise the profile of the frozen food industry and the issues our members are facing, directly with the government.

“We had a very productive discussion today about several issues which have been causing great concern to our members, including the rising energy prices and the 2023 cold water shrimp quota. I shall look forward to meeting with Minister Spencer at his earliest convenience, as the BFFF continues to work hard on behalf of our membership.”

Mr Stone commented: “I was impressed by the hard work of the BFFF team which went into organising the meeting at DEFRA this afternoon. We have a proud history of representing our members at the highest level of industry and government, and today’s meeting is another demonstration of the tireless efforts of the BFFF to promote the interests of the frozen food industry.

“The DEFRA officials we met today were very receptive to the points we raised. As a farmer by trade, Mr Spencer seems ideally placed as Food Minister and I anticipate that Rupert and myself will have a strong working relationship with the minister moving forward.”

The BFFF will continue to engage with DEFRA and other government departments, and the association looks forward to working with government ministers and officials.

Today’s meeting comes at the start of the British Frozen Food Federation’s 75^th anniversary year. Since 1948, frozen produce has developed to the unparalleled range and quality available in supermarkets today, and frozen food has become a staple of the weekly shop.

Mr Ashby added: “Consumers are increasingly seeing that frozen food is high quality, tastes great, and during a time of high inflation provides an affordable way to maintain a balanced diet. Frozen food also helps to reduce food waste, saving households money and reducing carbon emissions, due to the long shelf-life of frozen produce and easier portion control compared to fresh and chilled foods.”

On Friday 20^th January, the long-awaited results from the consultation on the deposit return scheme were finally published.

The consultation sought views on Defra’s plans to introduce a deposit return scheme for drinks containers and ran from 24th March to 4th June 2021

By creating a deposit return scheme, Government hopes to change consumer behaviour by increasing the recycling rate of drinks containers and reduce littering.

Views were sought on:

• how a deposit return scheme will operate
• scheme scope and design
• implementation timelines
• scheme enforcement

Defra will now work with industry, Welsh Government, and the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs in Northern Ireland, to set up the scheme.

The expected start date for the scheme is 1^st  October 2025.

You read the report in full here