On 11 and 12 December 2025, a comprehensive two-day conference titled ‘FoodTekPack’ took place in a well-designed co-located enclosed space alongside the second edition of the Intrapac exhibition in hall 10, at the India Expo Centre, Greater Noida. The event was organized by the IPP Group’s B2B magazines Packaging South Asia and IndiFoodBev, as well as its research, consulting, and event company IppStar. The conference was substantially and generously backed by IPAMA, the organizers of the second Intrapac exhibition. Dr Ainan Shahhidi contributed greatly to the conference with his compelling moderation of the event.
Parksons Packaging, Fasiculus, Vinsak, HP, Raas Intellisolutions, IIP, ASPA, and the Indian Rice Exporters’ Federation were among the sponsors and partners for the conference that sought to examine and innovate the Indian food supply chain, including its processing and sustainable packaging. Apart from the perspective of reducing food loss and food waste, the perspectives of overall carbon reduction in food production and the evolving supply chain and demand were discussed.
While the context of the conference was industry innovation, the subtext throughout was the need for improved investments in authentication and technology for improved efficiency. Whether it was carbon reduction in agricultural food production, processing, logistics, filling and sealing, or packaging and recycling, it was clear that the presenters, panelists, and the audience were on the same page – alive to the need for the rapid tweaking of mechanical and human solutions with better and automated collection of data, analyzed with the assistance of AI.
An unusual feature of the conference was that it brought together civil society, industry and government on a common platform around the common agenda of reducing food loss and food waste. The business of food is profitable but competitive and difficult. Investments in technology present the opportunity of increasing profit simply by reducing food loss and food waste. The possibilities of upcycling food and creating new products, formats, and shelf-life for domestic demand and exports are too obvious to ignore or to be developed in silos.
Every FoodTekPack session included speakers and panelists from leading brand owners, food product and hospitality companies such as Sandeep Ghosh of DS Spiceco, Arijit Mondal of Nestle, Priyanka Sharma of Marico, Swapnil Bharadwaj of Haldiram Snacks, Yogindra Patidar of UWC Foods, Aditi Jhala of The Misfits, Seema Atreya of Kanha Group, Abhishek Arora of LT Foods, Kalpam Chauhan of Mother Dairy, Himanshi Mahajan, Dr Ashish Pinto of Nespo, Nayandeep Banerjee of Pernod Ricard, Soumyanath Mishra of Mankind Pharma, Dr Prem Garg of the Indian Rice Exporters Association and Sanjay Gupta of DS Group.
Experts from the food technology, innovation, supplier and packaging converter, environment research, carbon footprint consulting, brand protection and recycling side were present, such as Dr Ritoja Basu of WRI India, K Ravi of Raas Intellisolutions, Nitanshi Agarwal of Banyan Nation, Dr Tribhuvan Singh Bisht of the Center for Science and Environment, Ashish Jain of the Indian Pollution Control Association, Dr Ishita Bhatnagar of Zissions, Nitin Sanduja of Buhler India, Dr Madhab Chakraborty of DMPCMS, Bhushan Namderao Yengade of Binder Technology, Srikanth Ramamurthy of Parksons Packaging, Dr Ajay Kumar Neema of Alok Masterbatches, Sushil Sharma of Sealed Air, Achintya Lahiri of Sidel, Avinash Bangale of Mamata Machinery, Jatin Talwar of Fasiculus, Raman Sharma of Vinsak, Barun Banerjee of Monofix Solutions, Priyesh Dalmia of Spectalpack and Suhail Bakshi of Bakshi Mark.
Forensic and authentication expert Dr Keshav Kumar was unable to personally attend the conference due to his being called at the last minute as an expert witness to an evidential hearing. Nevertheless, his excellent presentations on the authentication and integrity of the food supply and on the measures needed against adulteration and counterfeit food, FMCG, and pharmaceutical products were shown and read out in their respective sessions. Both sessions benefited from presentations by solutions providers and the respective panels of brand owners.
The delegate participants at the FoodTekPack were leading label, board, and flexible packaging converters and several important Indian and global equipment, consumables, and technology suppliers to the industry. Several representatives of leading technology and converting companies attended for the entire two days.
In conclusion, perhaps the uniqueness of the conference came from putting together the cross-sectoral collection of speakers, panelists and participants in the Indian food supply chain – educated farmers, food product producers, global and Indian food and hospitality brands, to processing technology, filling and sealing and sustainable, responsible and trackable packaging, and ultimately, to recyclable packaging structures and lateral recycling itself.
There were key inputs on upcycling innovative food products from waste and sidestreams, and on the automated collection of operational data and use of AI to improve efficiencies. The overview and insights to reducing the carbon footprint in the food industry seem immediately actionable, especially by companies that are able to see the big picture. The overview of the current plastic waste regulations and the imperatives and opportunities these present to the ever-growing and structured recyclable packaging and recycling industries was instructive.
The first FoodTekPack Conference in the Delhi NCR demonstrated support for high-level cross-sectoral discussion about the country’s largest industry in terms of value, employment, and potential exports. It also highlighted the enormously talented, experienced, and collaborative resources that we have in government, industry, and civil society that need to focus on leveraging and streamlining one industry at a time. A focused platform may be one of the ways to update and review the progress in the entire food supply chain and to share the needed and actionable changes and innovations to take it forward.
