Bells Food Group, Border Biscuits and shortbread specialist Dean’s of Huntly are among 13 Scottish food and drink producers to receive funding to help make their products healthier.
The businesses received funding from the Food and Drink Federation (FDF) Scotland as part of the Reformul8 Challenge Fund which supports Scottish food producers with the associated costs of reformulation. This was the third round of funding under the programme which saw £50,000 made available with businesses able to secure between £250 and £5,000 for projects.
FDF Scotland will be supporting food producers with a breadth of projects from salt reduction, fat reduction, fibre enrichment and sugar reduction. The fund will be used for a wide range of activities including accessing nutritional testing and technical support, working with ingredient suppliers to access and trial new innovative solutions that can improve the health of products, to developing new marketing and promotional materials.
Bells Food Group, which manufactures a range of pies and other pastry products, is using the funding the reduce fat.
“Bells Food Group is delighted to receive funding from the Reformul8 Challenge Fund to enable us to work to reduce the fat content in our pastry and pie products,” said a spokesperson for the firm.
This latest project follows on from the work the pastry specialist undertook last year to reduce the sodium in its pie shells by 50% with Reformul8 Challenge funding.
“The support from the Reformulation for Health programme allows our customers to enjoy our fabulous products knowing that we are working to make positive changes to the nutritional composition,” the spokesperson added.
To date, 45 businesses have benefited from the fund with projects including increasing fibre in bread products, lowering the fat content of meat products, lowering sugar and calories in chocolate, and lowering sugar and calories in ice cream.
“I can’t wait to start working on these interesting projects with some of Scotland’s well-loved producers. Together we will be helping to make everyday food including biscuits, crisps, pies, and haggis healthier. This in turn will improve the dietary health in communities across Scotland,” added Joanne Burns, reformulation for health manager, FDF Scotland.
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