The latest news, trends, analysis, interviews and podcasts from the global food and beverage industry

17 different carbon measurement initiatives launched in eight European countries. You wait for years for one carbon measurement initiative to come along and then 17 come all at once!

$13.3bn – the New York State budget gap which led Governor David Paterson to call for a 15% ‘obesity tax’ on non-diet soft drinks. "It looks like a money grab. Paterson is trying to grab money anywhere he can find it. This is a time when the government, just like families, needs to tighten its belt." – American Beverages Association.

6.6% – the amount of PET used in PET Engineering’s latest lightweight 50cl bottle, Bottle Fly. How low can you go? How high can you Fly?

29.3% – Britvic’s revenue growth in 2008 as announced in November. Squash makes headway while others suffer the squeeze.

$52bn – What InBev paid for Anheuser-Busch. No small beer.

1,400 – the number of jobs cut by Anheuser-Busch InBev in 2008. Sorrow drowning time.

201 entries in the 2008 Water Innovation Awards, presented in Wiesbaden as part of the Global Bottled Water Congress.

7% – New Zealand juice maker Charlie’s sales increase in its first four months of the current financial year. Up, and down under.

488 – the number of new products featured in the innovation pages of Beverage Innovation magazine in 2008. Go on, recommend a colleague to subscribe. How can you live without it?

€600m – what Japan’s Suntory paid for Danone’s antipodean Frucor.

$3.16bn – the combined sales of ready-to-drink coffee in Japan, North America and West Europe in 2006 according to Zenith International. Coffee to go go go.

23 – categories in the 2009 Beverage Innovation Awards @ drinktec. Go on, enter today. You know you want to!

438 – number of Kum & Go stores listing Celsius – the original calorie-burning drink – since December. Come and go for the burn.

€23bn – the sales of fruit juice and nectars in 2007, up 1.6% according to Zenith International. Sweet.

85% – the estimated amount of Pepsi Bottling Group’s waste stream which is recycled. What goes around, comes around.

1,000 – the number of Costa Coffee outlets when the company opened its store in Moscow’s Pushkin Square in March 2008. Ruskiccino.

5.9% – the advance in global soft drinks consumption in 2007 according to Zenith International. On your marks ...

800 – the number of trucks the UK's biggest food and drink companies were planning to take off the country’s roads by the end of 2008. Less is more.

1% – the amount soft drinks consumption dipped in 2007, despite the wettest summers since records began in the UK. It never r

(or rather, it does).

58% – the reduction in beverage calories shipped to schools since 2004, according to the American Beverages Association. How low can you go?