Australia and other southern hemisphere beef-producing nations are continuing to increase production volumes, despite a global trend of production decline, reveals Rabobank’s Q4 Global Beef Quarterly report.

Tapping into the latest food trend, provenance, free-range poultry producer The Free Ranger has launched new packaging and a marketing campaign dedicated to sharing the stories of its chickens.

In 2023, governments started prioritising food system changes as a key strategy in addressing climate change. Food Frontier executive director Dr Simon Eassom said further support for alternative proteins was required from government and industry to slow the rate of global warming.

Western Australia’s Wide Open Agriculture has signed a non-binding term sheet with Ingå Group, a UK firm developing functional and sustainable ingredient solutions for the food industry. Ingå is proposing to invest €500,000 in Wide Open Agriculture Germany GmbH.

Carlton & United Breweries (CUB) will change the name of its RTD beverage Hard Solo to Hard Rated following ABAC’s review of the product in response to public complaints about the brand name and can design.

Anticipating a bumper crop of plums, peaches, and nectarines, fresh produce company Montague is forecasting it will pack more than 6.6 million kilograms of stone fruit this season. Among the harvest will be a new nectarine variety: Nectara.

The $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund (NRF) is open for business, and can begin investing across seven key areas outlined in the newly published NRF Corporation Investment Mandate. 

The ACCC has decided it will not oppose Coles’ acquisition of two milk processing plants from dairy processor Saputo Dairy Australia located at Erskine Park, New South Wales and Laverton, Victoria.

Melanie Cooper has been appointed as the first female chair of Coopers Brewery in its 161-year history, taking over from Glenn Cooper who will step down in December after 22 years.

Food Innovation Australia Limited (FIAL) will soon deliver its Middle East Trade Readiness Forum, the first of a series of region-specific forums designed for Australian food businesses wanting to fast-track export and import developments.

The Australian Food & Grocery Council has released a position paper, highlighting the limitations of the term ‘ultra-processed foods’ in research focused on public health and environmental outcomes, and offering an alternative perspective.

Beston Global Food Company’s Lactoferrin capacity expansion has progressed forward as the company anticipates Lactoferrin sales to surpass 10MT in the first half of FY24.

Woolworths’ partnership with OzHarvest will see the supermarket match every dollar donated by customers to the charity's Christmas appeal in store and online until 26 December.

Global food and beverage group Retail Food Group (RFG) has entered into a conditional SPA to acquire Queensland pie maker Beefy’s Pies for $10 million. Family-owned, Beefy’s opened its first store in 1997.

New Zealand food solutions co-operative Alliance Group has partnered with MEQ to deploy lamb and beef probes powered by artificial intelligence across its entire plant network. The probes measure the Intramuscular Fat (IMF) levels in lamb and marbling percentages in beef.

Suntory Oceania has appointed Gordon Treanor as licensed sales director for Australia. Treanor will establish and lead the new Alcohol Route to Market team, a unit dedicated to executing sales, channel, and customer growth strategies in the Australian market.