CELEBRITY chef Sophie Grigson unveiled a school's £2 million technology unit and met dozens of food fans during a whirlwind visit to York.

The prolific food writer and star of her own TV series was in the city as a guest of the Festival of Food and Drink and staged a food demonstration at the Festival Theatre.

Sophie visited Burnholme Community College to officially open a new design and technology block, which was recently completed and houses the college's food technology section.

She watched a group of students practising for their heat of the Inter-Schools Cookery Challenge in the building, which took 18-months to build.

Sophie also threw her weight behind an Oxfam campaign which aims to tackle a coffee crisis which is hitting coffee growers world-wide.

York Oxfam workers hope to increase the public profile of fair trade coffee and reveal the human suffering behind prices in the coffee market which are at a 30-year low.

Campaigners claim that big coffee buyers, such as Nestl and Kraft, continue to enjoy massive profits while coffee farmers earn less for their crop than it cost them to grow it.

Sophie said if consumers paid a few extra pence for their coffee, the lives of millions could be improved.

She said: "When most people buy their coffee they assume the people who produce it are getting a fair price - but that is not the case."

Mark Dawson of York Oxfam Campaigns Group said: "Coffee buyers know there is terrible human suffering at the heart of their business and yet the do virtually nothing to help. It's time to name and shame them."

Updated: 11:41 Thursday, September 19, 2002