Significant growth in trade visitors, international participation and exhibitors

Innovations in all segments: Hygienic design, automation and conservation of ressources

The sixth Anuga FoodTec 2012, which closed its doors after four intensive trade fair days in Cologne, posted its best event result to date, and so impressively extended its top position as the internationally leading technology trade fair for the food and beverage industry. Anuga FoodTec's visitor numbers grew by around 25 per cent, totalling more than 42,000 trade visitors from 131 countries. "Anuga FoodTec was a complete success for the participating sectors. The trade fair's clear focus on the international food industry in conjunction with the pioneering topics such as food safety, sustainability and resource efficiency has sustainably extended the importance and momentum of Anuga FoodTec as the leading business, technology and know-how platform for the global food industry," was the conclusion drawn by Katharina C. Hamma, Chief Operating Officer of Koelnmesse GmbH, and Dr. Reinhard Grandke, Director General of the DLG (German Agricultural Society). Anuga FoodTec is the only event in the world that provides all sectors of the food industry with a process-oriented and cross-sector view covering all raw materials of the complete process chain for the production of food and beverages. Anuga FoodTec is organized by Koelnmesse and the DLG.
More than 42,000 trade visitors from 131 countries came to Anuga FoodTec to inform themselves about the core topics of food processing, food packaging and food safety. That represents an increase of approximately 25 per cent in comparison to the previous event. At the same time, the proportion of visitors from abroad increased by 16 per cent to its current 58 per cent. The numbers of visitors from eastern Europe - especially from Russia, Ukraine, the Czech Republic and Poland - and from Turkey, increased in particular. Considerably more specialist buyers from Asia - in particular from China, Japan, Thailand and India - also visited Anuga FoodTec.
The exhibitors at Anuga FoodTec were particularly impressed by the quality and internationality of the trade visitors, and reported extremely good discussions with high-level decision-makers. Many of the partners in these discussions approached the companies with questions about concrete projects, so that extremely promising post-fair business is to be expected.
The visitor survey at Anuga FoodTec confirmed the strength of the crossover concept. The results showed that more than 83 per cent of the visitors surveyed evaluated the product range at Anuga FoodTec as very good or good.
Exhibitor participation in Anuga FoodTec also grew by more than ten per cent. 1,334 suppliers from 41 countries presented their technical innovations and solutions in Cologne. At the same time, foreign participation increased by five per cent to more than 50 per cent.
The three central topics at Anuga FoodTec 2012 were hygienic design, automation and sustainability. 
The trend towards hygienic design ran through the entire trade fair and so underlined the importance of the topic of hygiene and thus food safety.
Increasing automation and system integration emphasize that the individual process itself is of relatively less importance than its integration in overall production sequences. 
In the area of sustainability, numerous exhibitors presented solutions for increasing resource efficiency, whether by means of an improved utilization of the materials used or a more economical approach to increasingly scarce resources such as energy and drinking water.
Organized by the DLG, the trend topics were tackled and accompanied by a comprehensive, unique supporting programme which provided visitors with concrete solutions to current questions and future developments.
The renowned International FoodTec Award was presented to 18 Anuga FoodTec innovation projects. Eight innovations received the International FoodTec Award in Gold, ten in Silver.
Bio-plastics, biologically degradable packaging and new packaging ideas were the topics at the widely acclaimed special show "FutureLab", which was initiated by Anuga FoodTec together with the Köln International School of Design. Design students working on site in several working groups developed innovative ideas and draft designs for food and beverage packaging "live".
The special show Robotik-Pack-Line 2012 demonstrated the potential that robotics offers for manufacturers of food and beverages. The special show presented the hygienic packaging of fresh meat, the secondary packaging and palletising of food and the hygienic filling of liquids.