PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT AND PROMOTION

Marketing and Promotion
Laws and Regulations
Trends

Ferrante (1998) reports that Fernando J. Palacios, director of food and beverage practices of KPMG Peat Marwick that "In Asia, in general, you can find products from Kraft, Nestle, Unilever, Campbell's Soup, Pillsbury, Kellogg's. Just about every major food compnay has made some type of investment in Asia. Many of these companies choose or are "encouraged" to establish plants in the country. This causes food product development problems as their may have to be reformulation due to available ingredients. In Asia it is not necessarily "cheaper" to establish plants. Part of the problems are the high transportation costs, duties, and inefficent work force. The culture of work and automation is different.

Giese (1998) reports on the China and its 1.3 billion consumer is a potential market for US exporters. If the US food industry will become involved they must help China overcome their problems of poor management, low productivity, and antiquated production facilities and technology. He also (1998b) reported on Japan as the thrid-largest food ingredient market in the world. Certainly, we in Oregon know that it is both an export and import market. With the _ plant in Salem, we know that Japan is looking to the US to purchase foods. The Sunday Oregonian (Read, 1998) reported the benefit of exporting one product to Asia. As noted, the increased importance of the export has greatly affected even a small commodity like the cherry industry.

Katz, F. (1999) reports on the change in the food industry in Europe and the impact of the new European market. There trends do not appear to be different than in the U.S. Katz listed these as