The food and beverage industry has made some major moves in recent days in the struggle over super-sweet products. Major cereal-makers Nestle and General Mills pledged to cut sugar and salt content in children's breakfast cereals abroad, while soda and restaurant trade groups sued to stop a New York City ban on sales of large sugary drinks.

DB Schenker has introduced DB Schenkersmartbox, a new service for monitoring global freight movements.

Americold, a provider specializing in temperature-controlled warehousing and logistics services to the food industry, has introduced a new product to coordinate and expedite the delivery of less-than-truckload (LTL) and full truckload shipments.

Despite tight budgets preventing retail and consumer (R+C) executives from updating security programs and causing them to fall behind, many remain confident in their business practices, according to findings from PwC's new report, "R+C Insights: Changing the Game." The report surveyed more than 1,100 senior R+C industry executives and found that regardless of this lag in technological advances, adversaries are becoming ever more sophisticated, breaching the defenses of business ecosystems and leaving reputational, financial and competitive damage in their wake.

In a case that has potentially significant consequences for NFC and RFID applications, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission is cracking down on so-called "phone home" technologies used by computer rental companies to monitor consumer behavior. When contemplating the use of any technology that provides use, location or other information about a product, retailers should be careful to ensure consumers know - or are at least able to know - exactly what the product is doing once they leave the store.

The number of Wi-Fi enabled devices shipped in 2012 is expected to surpass 1.5 billion. Growth is occurring across many markets, including mobile handsets, laptops, media tablets, printers, TVs and automotive.

U.S.-based retailers looking to get into international shipping should expect to see an increase in revenue, according to Craig Turnbull, CEO of Bongo International, just as long as they understand the market, the shipping industry and the needs of their customers. "There is an opportunity to increase revenue from 3 percent to 10 percent," Turnbull said.

Wal-Mart has long had what is virtually beyond question the largest retail supply chain, as measured by number of suppliers, global reach, volume of material, and overall spend on supplier goods. Wal-Mart also has been touted as an innovator in supply-chain management, but it's more accurate to say it uses its sheer size and market power to manipulate the supply chain.

Ecospan has developed a ready-to-use bioplastic shipping enclosure for high-value goods.

Online shoppers in the U.S. will spend $54.47bn this holiday season - nearly a 17-percent increase over the $46.63bn spent last year, according to the 2012 Mindset of a Multichannel Shopper survey.