Sweet trade fair sees greater complexity in control technology
The Pro Sweets team noted that in order to counter the growing problem of fraud in confectionery product manufacture, more and more major producers are using complicated shapes with impressive decoration, which is impacting on equipment design in terms of larger pouring systems.
Indeed, a 2007 report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), showed that confectionery along with alcohol products are some of the most faked food and drink items.
Also becoming more evident in machinery development, continued the organisers, is the inclusion of tooling to enable even shorter changeover times to ensure greater flexibility when switching products on a line.
This trend, they add, is also is having an impact on suppliers of packaging equipment and packaging materials to the confectionery industry, with requirements for faster changeovers to allow for products with more complex packages.
Packaging systems must now be able to produce conventional packaging as well as smaller packaging to meet growing demands for once-off promotions with accordingly low adjustment work, said the Pro Sweets team.
And short cleaning and maintenance times as well as sustainable reduction of energy and packaging materials to adhere to high efficiency and minimal waste pressures are still notable drivers in packaging machinery innovation aimed at the sector, they continued.
Indeed, air and energy consumption, noise pollution and thermal balance have now become an integral part of processing and packaging equipment designed for the sweets and chocolate industry.
The organisers said that Pro Sweets 2010 achieved new growth in all categories of exhibitors, visitors and exhibition area.
The event saw 325 exhibiting companies from 30 countries, an improvement on 2009’s 307 stands, they added. Of these participants, 141 companies came from Germany and 184 were from abroad, the share of visitors from abroad rose from 50 to 60 per cent, said the trade fair team.
