Mid Suffolk district is home to a range of numerous and diverse businesses ranging from world famous brands such as Dulux and Bosch, down to entrepreneurial small 'niche market' companies. Did you know that the malt in the centre of every Malteser comes from Stowmarket!

The district has a strong cluster of quality food and drink businesses from growers of fresh herbs, vegetables and fruit to manufacturers of interesting and tasty produce for your kitchen - and don't forget the restaurants and pubs, many of which serve locally produced food and drink as well!

Many are members of Tastes of Anglia (opens new window) - an organisation that promotes the fine food and drink produced in the East of England.

There are also clusters of successful manufacturing and engineering, haulage and logistics companies within the district. Mid Suffolk has the LOWEST number of recorded redundancies for any district in Suffolk along with one of the lowest levels of unemployment rates.

What's new: 

Eye Airfield Consultation- the Council is putting together a Development Brief to identify areas at Eye Airfield suitable for future development, especially for employment.  Following recent consultation, a new vision for how the airfield could grow is outlined the in second Newsletter. Please send any comments on these updated proposals to Dawn Easter, Economic Development Officer email: Dawn.Easter@MidSuffolk.gov.uk by 24th February

SABRE is offering small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs)/social enterprises (SEs) in Suffolk the opportunity to discover their potential to generate renewable energy by providing them with independent and impartial support and advice on investment opportunities created by Feed-in Tariffs and the Renewable Heat Incentive. For further information please click here

 London 2012 Olympics .A website has been created for businesses to find out more about the variery of contracts arising from both the construction of  new facilities for the London Olympics and the actual games themselves.  A leaflet about generating new business from the 2012 games is available from the Economic Development Officer. https://www.competefor.com/business/login.jsp

Growth Prospects
Mid Suffolk is within the Haven Gateway sub-region, which had been given growth point status by the government. Much of the future growth in the district is expected to come as a result of the £240m expansion of the Port of Felixstowe.

Our excellent links to the Midlands and the Continent via the A14 make the district an ideal base for logistic and other port related businesses. The direct rail links to Cambridge and London by the rail stations at Elmswell, Stowmarket and Needham Market make the area a popular choice for communters too.

Our largest town of Stowmarket has recently grown at 4 times the rate of the average Market Town. It will be the focus of significant housing growth in the future as well, managed by the Stowmarket Masterplan and Stowmarket Area Action Plan. New allocations of employment land will be made to compliment the housing growth, providing better opportunities for people to both live and work in the town. Stowmarket currently has plans for over £50m of investment projects in the next 5 years including a brand new £7m supermarket for Morrisons.