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About Our Industry

A successful food and drink sector is a vital component of a healthy Scottish economy and is classed as a priority industry.

Our dynamic and innovative sector is focused on delivering what consumers want and has excelled when it comes to meeting demands for convenience, variety and choice; for products that offer health and nutrition benefits.

Food and drink manufacturing is an intensely competitive sector and has been consolidating in recent years through mergers and acquisitions. Nevertheless there is still room in Scotland for small to medium-sized enterprises to flourish, often producing specialist food products for consumers around the world.

We are also part of a global food industry, embracing worldwide sourcing and supply of ingredients. For some companies, exporting products to overseas markets is vital to the success of their operations; others have operations in many countries, producing a wide range of products under well-known brand names.

Industry statistics

• The industry in Scotland employs around 50,000 people and generates sales of £7.57 billion and exports worth £3.57 billion.
• The food and drink manufacturing industry in Scotland accounts for 11.8% of the UK sector workforce.
• The food and drink manufacturing industry is the single largest manufacturing sector in the UK, with a turnover of £72.8bn, with a gross value added of £21.6bn [1], accounting for 15% of the total manufacturing sector. Ours is the fourth largest food and drink manufacturing industry in the world.
• The industry employs some 440,000 people. This represents 14% of the manufacturing workforce in the UK. In addition, an estimated 1.2 million workers in ancillary activities depend on a successful food and drink industry for their jobs.
• The sector is an important trading partner with Europe: exporting almost £10bn of food and drink products a year, two-thirds of which go the EU. We are the world's eighth largest exporter of food and drink [2].
• The industry is an important partner of British farming: buying two-thirds of all the UK's agricultural produce. All this economic activity is carried out by just over 7,000 food and drink enterprises - the vast majority of which are small companies, many employing less than 10 people.

Source: Food and Drink Federation/Food From Britain/National Statistics

1. Information taken from latest ONS Annual Business Inquiry
2. Download the full UK Food and Drink Performance (2009) statistics research report (pdf | 228kb) - Research carried out by Leatherhead Food Research for the Food and Drink Federation (April 2010)