BIOFACH 2016 and its sister fair for personal care VIVANESS welcomed an enormous range of organic products from all over the world to Nuremberg Messe, February 10-13. Organic 3.0 ‘Action for more organic’ and going ‘Beyond Organic’ were major themes aimed at bringing more sustainable agriculture and high-quality organic certified products to market globally, along with better business practices and living habits. BIOFACH 2016 proved again it was the most international stage to see new trends and innovative products. Exhibitors spoken with by the OWN team covering the show said that despite a slower than expected fourth day on Saturday they were happy with the show after meeting new and existing customers and visitors.

In spite of the impression of less traffic, the show organizers reported a visitor record for BIOFACH and VIVANESS 2016 as the trade fair duo welcomed approximately 48,000 visitors, confirming that the industry is growing.

Petra Wolf of NürnbergMesse’s management board said: “VIVANESS celebrated its 10th birthday in 2016 and was congratulated by an industry that highlighted over the four days of the exhibition how involved, innovative, value-conscious and modern the organic market is nowadays.”

“We share the joy the industry takes from its success and are delighted that there was a great atmosphere in the exhibition halls.”

Raw & Vegan continue as top trends.

Major product trends at BIOFACH 2016 continue to be raw and vegan. And adding superfoods to chocolate bars, snack/energy bars, breakfast cereals, beverages, and spreads continues. Standout products in chocolate were:

• The new Andean Rose, Passion fruit (Maracuja) and Andean Lemon Verbena flavours introduced by Ecuadorian firm Pacari Chocolate, the World’s top brand with the most awards
• Chocolate Tohi bars from Dolfin of Belgium for taste and attractive packaging that is was fully recyclable and sustainable
• Cacao Crudo vegan and raw chocolate bars made in Italy for cacao taste and clean packaging design that is recyclable
• Lovechock of the Netherlands’ new organic raw chocolate Mylk with 70% cacao had a creamy, nutty taste and home compostable/recyclable packaging. The product won the visitors Best New Product Award BIOFACH 2016 for Grocery Products Snacks & Sweets
• First-time exhibitor, Loving Earth of Australia, presented raw and vegan chocolates with clean cacao taste and fully compostable/recyclable packaging
• Poland’s Surovital with its Co Coa range offered great dark chocolate taste and excellent on the go snacks foods plus the Bananas in Raw Chocolate 70%
• Nara of Germany presented raw and dark chocolate bars in 70% (7% sugar) and 100% (no sugar) ‘wild grown cacao’ from Bolivia providing amazing authentic flavour

Also excellent were the UK’s Raw Chocolate Co’s dark chocolate bars, and Pana Chocolates of Australia for taste and sustainable packaging.

Standouts in snack and energy bars.

Lifefood of Czech Republic presented their Raw Sage snack bars and raw and vegan chocolate bars, and Canada’s Riverside Foods added more lines to its great tasting range of Made Good organic snack bars.

In Spreads, Windmill Organics of the UK’s Pro-Fusion Hemp Peanut Butter was a great taste sensation; while Bio Today of The Netherlands’ had an excellent Tahini (sesame seed) spread and extensive line of snack foods.

And new chia seed products continued to emerge with more chia oils launched by Naturkost Uebelhoer and Andean Grain while Chia Birds and Chia Apple Cider were new launches in chia beverages.