Kevin T. Higgins

With more supermarket chains cracking down on shoplifting and installing anti-theft hardware, Cryovac Food Packaging is introducing meat soaker pads with concealed pockets to hold electronic article surveillance (EAS) tags.

Single-serve containers remain sales-growth leaders at many beverage companies, including dairies, but they pose special challenges in delivering leak resistance and easy opening.

Guided microwave spectroscopy has kept fighter planes out of harm's way. Now it's helping provide in-line analysis of fat and moisture content in ground beef.

During its three decades on American soil, German machinery firm Rovema Packaging Machines has staked out the vertical form/fill/seal packaging space.

While source reduction and recycling programs have advanced elsewhere, U.S. efforts to reduce packaging waste are stuck on hold.

The controls technology toolbox is full; now it's a matter of deploying the automation firepower in food and beverage plants.

Simmering a pot of rice may be a dying art, judging by convenience-driven rollouts of ready-to-heat precooked rice products.

Food and beverage companies are getting hooked on the sales growth in supercenters and club stores, and that requires some adjustments in manufacturing practices.

If R&D energy is converted to commercial action, 2004 could be a watershed year for many types of shelf-stable products, including aseptic particulates.

The partnership that runs Smithfield Foods' BEST BioFuel division is gearing up to convert swine manure to biomethanol, a renewable component of biodiesel and a possible solution for a nagging environmental problem for the food industry.