Weekly Digest: Symrise nominated for Sustainability Award, innovation in cricket protein flours

20 Jul 2018 --- Symrise has been nominated for the German Sustainability Award. Cricket protein brand Seek, has launched a new line of high protein and sustainable baking flours. Michel Burla, Managing Director of the Cereals and Ingredients Division of the Hochdorf Group, is to step down at the end of this year and GEA has been working with Almarai Company in Saudi Arabia to build the nation’s largest and most modern dairy processing facility.

In brief: Sustainability
Symrise has been nominated for the German Sustainability Award. Having already received the award in 2012 and made it into the final round in 2016, Symrise has been nominated again this year for the award. The flavor manufacturer integrates the challenges of sustainable development into its operational decision-making processes to achieve social, environmental and economic successes over the short, medium and long-term. Symrise employs efficient processes and technologies to protect limited natural raw materials over the long term in order to protect biodiversity in the regions threatened by global change. Symrise is also looking to establish 100 percent traceability for strategic raw materials by 2020.

In brief: Ingredient launches

Cricket protein brand Seek, has launched a line of baking flours, which are high in protein and sustainable, according to the company. The pure cricket protein powder can also be used in combination with any of the other flours to increase the nutritional content or boost the delightfully nutty cricket flavor. Seek is collaborating with some of the nations most talented and respected chefs and bakers to launch the new flour line. The goal is to educate and empower anyone who is looking to cook healthy and sustainable foods, from home chefs to culinary professionals from all corners of the globe. Each chef is creating an original recipe that will be compiled into a new cookbook, the first ever of its kind. The highly curated group includes chefs with a focus on farm to table sustainable foods, Native American, Mexican and Asian cuisines that have traditionally incorporated crickets, and healthy, nutritious ingredients and the idea of food as medicine.

In brief: Appointments & retirements
Michel Burla, Managing Director of the Cereals and Ingredients Division of the Hochdorf Group and a member of the group’s senior management team, has decided to pursue a change of career. For this reason, the Board of Directors and leadership team has announced that he will be leaving the company at the end of December 2018. Burla took over as head of the group’s Cereals and Ingredients division on 1 February 2013. Drawing on his experience and great commitment, he was highly influential in working with his team to successfully develop the international division into a company producing healthy foods, based on cereals, fruits and vegetables.

In brief: Other highlights
GEA has been working with Almarai Company in Saudi Arabia to build the nation’s largest and most modern dairy processing facility. The new plant at Al Kharj includes multiple production lines for a wide range of milk and yogurt products. It has the capacity to process two million liters of milk a day. The project has already been completed and the plant is now in operation. Key features of the plant at Al Kharj include GEA separators with an integrated direct drive that have fewer moving parts and so reduce friction losses. They also use asynchronous motors that are extremely robust for maximum machine availability. To reduce the environmental impact and energy consumption, the plant is equipped with GEA’s latest energy recovery technology.

Dairygold has launched a series of measures to proactively address the current and longer-term issues relating to the summer drought which has seen grass growth plummet to 30 percent of normal levels for this time of year. From its ongoing fodder surveys, Dairygold has identified a potential current shortfall of circa 25 percent of winter fodder supplies. In recognition of this and the current prolonged period of drought, the Society has launched a number of key mitigation measures to support farmers at this time. These measures are designed to mitigate the current grass shortages and also to facilitate the provision of sufficient fodder for the coming winter.

Finally, Suiker Unie has advised the Cosun cooperative’s farmers to plant fewer beet in spring 2019 in order to reduce their beet crop for the 2019 campaign by 10-15 percent. The definitive reduction will be announced in autumn 2018 depending on the world market outlook and the further development of the 2018 crop. The 2018 harvest is expected to be similar to that for 2017, with record yields of more than 15 tons of sugar per hectare. At the same time, export prices for white sugar are at a ten-year low. Suiker Unie has invested in 300,000 m3 of additional thick juice storage in the past ten years, enabling it to store substantial volumes of sugar to guarantee sufficient sugar supplies to its customers inside and outside the EU in 2019/2020.

By Elizabeth Green