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Dale Farm, the UK dairy products business, is investing over £4 million to increase sales of its range of products including cheese, butter and yoghurt in existing and new markets it has targeted for faster growth.

Northern Ireland's leading dairy company also owns yoghurt producers Rowen Glen in Scotland and Loseley in Cumbria, and is aiming to enhance its productivity and overall competitiveness particularly in export markets by investing in an extensive training programme. The company currently employs almost 500 people and exports dairy products, including milk powder, to 45 countries.

Martin and Tracy Hamilton, Directors of Mash Direct, Comber, pictured with Maynard Mawhinney (centre), Invest NI Food director. Mash Direct will be attending the Summer Fancy Food Show in New York with an Invest NI group.

Smaller food companies are being helped by Invest Northern Ireland to explore new business opportunities in the US. Eleven companies are visiting the Summer Fancy Food Show in New York, from 29 June to 1 July, on an Invest NI sectoral trade mission.

Eight Northern Ireland beef and lamb processors were given an opportunity to bid for business from many of Spain's leading retailers, including Carrefour and Eroski, during a recent ???meet the buyer' event organised jointly by Invest Northern Ireland and the Livestock and Meat Commission.

Pitching for new business in Spain at the event in Invest NI's Belfast headquarters were: ABP, Lurgan; Dunbia, Dungannon; C&J Meats, Armagh; Doherty and Gray, Ballymena; Hewitt Meats, Loughgall; Linden Meats, Dungannon; Omagh Meats, Omagh and WD Meats, Coleraine.

Northern Ireland based convenience foods specialist, Millar Savoury Foods, has launched a new range of quality pies under its established Millfarm brand for independent retailers. The company, which recently secured a major distribution deal with Nicco Foods of Cheshire, has added chicken and ham, cottage and mince beef with onion to its Mill Farm range.

Willowbrook Farm in Killinchy, which has British Retail Consortium certification at ???higher??? level status, has secured business from the Co-Operative for lettuce bags throughout supermarkets in the United Kingdom that could be worth more than £1 million this year.

Sunstart, the Northern Ireland baker of gluten and wheat-free biscuits, cookies and traybakes, recently helped Morrisons, the UK supermarket group, win a top industry award for a healthy product.

Caramel shortbread slices, produced by Sunstart, which bakes only gluten and wheat-free products, and sold by Morrisons under its ???Free From' own label gained the top award in the health/wellbeing category in the annual awards for own label products run by The Grocer magazine, the first for a Northern Ireland based company.

Northern Ireland based Willowbrook Farm, a major supplier of vegetables and salads to the retail and foodservice sectors in the United Kingdom and Ireland, is to invest almost £4 million in a new state-of-the-art processing plant.

The expansion is being made to enable the BRC accredited company to meet the growing demand from top retailers including the Co-Operative in the UK and the Musgrave/SuperValu and Centra chain in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

A Northern Ireland bakery has become the first in the United Kingdom to apply the Food Standards Agency's traffic light labelling system on a premium range of its cakes. Graham's Home Bakery, based in Dromore in County Down, launched its new Indulgent by Graham's premium cake range at the recent Food and Drink show in Birmingham.

The new luxury cakes currently feature three flavours - banofee, cappuccino and chocolate.

Top artist Lady Dufferin has launched her own packaging with unique labeling based on her distinctive paintings. She's helped to create a new brand identity for Clandeboye Yoghurt, which is produced in a new processing plant on her estate at Bangor in Northern Ireland.

The yoghurt lids and promotional materials feature colourful landscapes with the estate's award winning Holstein and Jersey herds.

Cheshire-based distributor Nicco Foods has added Millar Savoury Foods, the Northern Ireland convenience and snack food business, to its list of suppliers.

Nicco Foods will market and distribute Millar's range of products that includes scotch eggs, burgers, pies and jumbo hotdogs throughout Great Britain. Millar Savoury also recently signed a deal to supply its products to Norfolk Line in Kent for its ferries. The company has achieved grade A BRC accreditation.