The Berry Scotland Programme aims to increase the consumption of Scottish soft fruit in Scotland for the benefits of population health and the Scottish berry industry. Achievement of the programme's aims will be overseen by the Berry Scotland Board, a multi-sectoral group of experts from health, agriculture, land use, variety development, product development and marketing.

Berries have been found to contain higher levels of antioxidants than most other fruits and, being a Scottish crop, the health and economy of Scotland could be considerably improved if home grown strawberries, raspberries and blackcurrants become Scottish staple foods. In Scotland, levels of heart disease, stroke and cancer are among the highest in Europe and we hope that by promoting the health benefits of soft fruit, we can help increase the consumption of Scottish berries and improve the health of the Scottish population.

Aims:

• To increase the production, sales and consumption of Scottish soft fruits through an multi-sectoral coalition uniting health, agricultural and food industry interests.
• To facilitate the reduction of chronic diet related disease through helping the population to reach the target 5 portions of fruit and vegetables a day.
• To co-ordinate and promote investigation into the development of berries and berry products.
  

Part of the programme will involve a review of the following health and rural affairs issues:

• Understanding the specific health properties relevant to Scottish berries.
• Understanding consumer influences on Scottish berry consumption.
• Assessing outlets for berry usage eg NHS and local authority.
• Identifying current production and demand.
• Reviewing current berry processing and how this might be further extended or diversified.
• In conjunction with Scottish Enterprise, identifying products that might be developed from Scottish berries and how these might be progressed to the test stage.

It is hoped also to identify research and development capacity within Scotland and to help facilitate new research with academic and industrial partners.

Board meetings are held several times a year. The minutes from these meetings are freely available on request.

The Board

The Berry Scotland board is a Scotland wide multi-sectoral group comprising experts from nutrition, land use, variety development, fruit production, product development, laboratory, clinical and public health. The role of the board is to develop and implement an action plan following a comprehensive review of health and rural affairs issues.

Professor Annie Anderson
Director and Professor of Food Choice at the Centre for Public Health Nutrition Research, University of Dundee.

Prof Annie Anderson, (BSc PhD SRD RPHN) graduated in 1979 as a dietitian and after two years in clinical practice has pursued a research career with posts in the Universities of Cambridge, Aberdeen, Glasgow and the MRC Medical Sociology Unit. Research interests focus on factors that influence food choice, dietary assessment methodology and the impact of dietary selection on human health. Diet and health inequalities has been a major theme of recent work and current research involves assessing the impact of dietary interventions in studies of free living individuals. She is editor of The Journal of Human Nutrition and Dietetics (Blackwell Science), an expert member of the UK Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN) and is currently a member of the Scottish Executive expert panel on school meals.
Contact details:
Prof Annie Anderson,
Centre for Public Health Nutrition Research, Department of Medicine, University of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital and Medical School, Dundee DD1 9SY.
Tel: 01382 496442 Fax: 01382 496452
email: a.s.anderson@dundee.ac.uk

Dr James Dunbar
Dr James Dunbar is a founder member of the Berry Scotland Programme.

Professor Mike Lean
Professor of Human Nutrition and Head of Human Nutrition Department at University of Glasgow.

Professor Lean holds the position of Rank Chair of Human Nutrition at the University of Glasgow where he is also a Consultant Physician at Glasgow Royal Infirmary. He trained in medicine at the University of Cambridge and St Bartholemew's.
His clinical training was mainly in Aberdeen but he returned to Cambridge to join the scientific staff of the Medical Research Council and University of Cambridge Dunn Nutrition Unit. Here he embarked on a research career in nutrition, specialising in obesity and energy balance and completed higher professional training in diabetes.
In 1992 he was appointed to his present position, teaching and directing research into human nutrition. He maintains a full clinical input in General Acute Medicine, Diabetes and in the Nutrition Support Team. He has increasingly become involved in public health and health promotion measures to prevent disease and promote good health through healthy eating. In 1995 he was appointed to the Health Education board for Scotland.
Contact details:
Prof Mike Lean,
Human Nutrition Department, Queen Elizabeth Building, Glasgow Royal Infirmary, Glasgow G31 2ER
Tel:0141 2114686 Fax: 0141 2114844
email: mejl1g@clinmed.gla.ac.uk

Andrew Logan
Soft Fruit Grower and Chairman of Scotfruit.

Andrew Logan has over 30 years experience in the fruit and vegetable industry. In the early 1970s he was the chairman of the soft fruit and vegetable committee of the National Farmers Union (Scotland). He was then instrumental in setting up a co-operative allowing the Kingdom of Fife to become a major vegetable producer. His current enterprise is with Scotfruit, an innovative and forward thinking company dedicated to supplying supermarkets and specialist fruit manufacturers with fresh and frozen quality Scottish soft fruit. Scotfruit has also been involved in creating one of the first Producer Organisations dedicated to fruit in Scotland (Berry Growers Ltd). The key objectives of Berry Growers Ltd include improving product quality and safety, consolidated marketing and season extension and improving the environment.
Contact details:
Andrew Logan
Tel 01334 652941
email: a.logan@btconnect.com

Ronnie McNicol
Independant Scientific Consultant, Breeder and Propagator.

Ronnie McNicol has 28 years experience working with soft fruit. He was head of fruit research at the Scottish Crop Research Institute and managing director of ReDeva, concentrating on producing soft fruit varieties which have good eating quality and high levels of antioxidants. Ronnie is now an independent consultant for the soft fruit industry.
Contact details:
Ronnie McNicol,
Tel: 01382 561251
email: greenhill.propagation@btinternet.com

Ewan Pate
Soft Fruit Grower and Director of Saltire Fruits

Ewan Pate has 30 years experience in growing raspberries. He was chairman of the Scottish Soft Fruit Discussion Society and then National Farmers Union (Scotland) soft fruit convenor. Latterly he was chairman of Scottish Soft Fruit Growers and is director of Saltire Fruits, a company specialising in producing chilled raspberry pulp for the processing industry. Ewan is also farming correspondent for The Courier and Advertiser newpaper.
Contact details:
Ewan Pate,
Tel: 01382 504637
email: ewan.pate@virgin.net

Anne Thomson
Marketing Consultant, Gallagher Associates and Managing Director, Ella Drinks

Having worked for an American advertising agency in London on well known brands and then for Shell UK in market research and retail in both London and Glasgow she has seen how big companies develop brands. Coming back to Scotland in 1987 allowed her to work with the Scottish food and drink industry and other commercial sectors as a consultant in product development and market research.
Her interest is in helping the primary produce sectors, in which Scotland excels, to develop added value products with value added here in Scotland and which allow such produce to freature in the diets of the UK consumer. This will bring many benefits for the Scottish economy, including the provision of jobs which bring knowledge skills north of the border. As a farmer's daughter from Angus she feels that farming needs to be in touch with what consumer markets seek and be driven more by the market rather than by subsidies or big business. This in the long term would give farms more control over their businesses and lead to stronger rural development.
Contact Details:
Anne Thomson
Tel: 01786 834342
email: info@bouvrage.com

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Berry Scotland Advisory Group
An advisory group has also been set up to give guidance to the programme board and the scientific co-ordinator on certain issues. Members of the advisory group include:

• Dr Rex Brennan Scottish Crop Research Institute
• Allene Bruce Scottish Enterprise
• Dr Garry Duthie Rowett Research Institute
• Alan Stevenson Scottish Agricultural Organisation Society Ltd
• Vivien Collie, Marketing Consultant