New Five-step Guide Launched to Boost UK Food and Drink Exports

The guide, entitled Food and drink exporting - Five steps to success, encourages current and would-be exporters to consider the core elements of the export process and provides tips and relevant contact details.

It is broken down into five sections: Step One - Is now the right time to export?; Step Two - Do your research; Step Three - Create opportunities; Step Four - Export practicalities; and Step Five - Growing export.

UK food and drink exports reached a record £20bn in 2016, while branded food and drink exports grew 11.5 per cent to £5.2bn. FDF states that it has ambitions to help grow exports of UK branded goods by a third by 2020 to more than £6bn.

In addition to the new guide, FDF has encouraged the government to work with the industry to scale-up its provision of specialist food and drink export support by putting in place a one-stop shop to support small and medium-sized exporters.

Angela Coleshill, competitiveness director at FDF said, “We hope that our guide will enable more of the UK’s 6,800 food and drink producers to grow their businesses by becoming successful exporters. Manufacturers in competing nations typically benefit from more generous government export support than those in the UK, so it is essential that organisations such as FDF and FDEA work together to help unlock our industry’s huge potential.

“While our future trading terms with the EU are unclear, now is the time for British businesses to embrace new opportunities in non-EU countries and take advantage of rising demand to make inroads into new markets.”

John Whitehead, director of FDEA said, “There’s great interest across the globe in UK food and drink, which continues to possess a reputation for real quality. We’d like to see more manufacturers look beyond their domestic market and take advantage of these opportunities, which can really help businesses grow.”

The full guide can be accessed here.