One of the biggest challenges for the food and drink industry in Northern Ireland is currency movement, according to Michael Bell, Executive Director of the Northern Ireland Food & Drink Association (NIFDA).
“The average net margin for most food manufacturers is below 3 per cent, but the euro/sterling exchange rate has moved over 10 per cent in the last nine months, and that is beyond the range of some companies to adapt,” he says.
While NIFDA can’t control currency movement, it does try to create a fair environment, says Michael, a chartered food scientist who helped to found the organisation in 1996. It seeks to give its 102 full and 24 associate members a voice and acts as an “industry self-help” group, he adds.
Training suppliers
NIFDA recently pioneered training in the Grocery Suppliers Code of Practice in Northern Ireland. “A retailer may be 20-30 per cent of a supplier’s turnover but, almost in every case, a supplier will be a tiny fraction of the retailer’s turnover – there is a major imbalance there,” explains Michael. “So it is very important that suppliers are trained in understanding their rights and obligations.”
Small companies have also benefited from NIFDA’s involvement in Access 6, an EU-funded INTERREG project that recently provided training and mentorship to 90 food and drink-related SMEs in border regions in Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and Western Scotland.
“Many small food companies are export-averse, so we created an e-learning training package around exports and an online distribution tool that lets you plan and cost transport of goods. These are legacies from the project,” he says.
“We export four-fifths of what we produce in Northern Ireland. Local food has a lot of advantages relating to air-miles and carbon dioxide. That said, it is very important that we export and that other markets remain open and don’t decide they are only going to eat local food.”
Educating consumers
NIFDA has had a “long and very productive” relationship with safefood, according to Michael. “We have the challenges of building more integrity into food on many dimensions: fraud, microbiological and chemical safety,” he says, emphasising the importance of consumer awareness. “It is becoming increasingly apparent that consumers need more education to understand these aspects of food products.”
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