Dried ginger for export
Dried ginger for export Cue: Drying fruits and vegetables preserves them and ensures that they retain all of their nutritional goodness. But there is another reason that drying fruits or vegetables can be rewarding ? it can produce profit, especially if your organisation or farmers? group can export to International markets. But as Adu Domfeh found out when he visited the Yogi Botanicals ginger exporting group, the standards are strict, and the work is hard. There are rules to follow for washing, slicing, drying and packaging ? particularly for organic produce. But the task is not impossible ? if you are hard working and able to get financial credit for investing in processing technology, you could reap the rewards. To explain more, director Daniel A. Mensah takes us on a tour through the processing yards of Yogi Botanicals. IN: ?I am Daniel A. Mensah? OUT: ? to meet the international standard.? DUR?N: 5?50? BACK ANNOUNCEMENT: That was Adu Domfeh reporting from Kumasi in Ghana. He was speaking to Daniel Mensah and Kojo Tera from Yogi Botanicals, a cooperative exporting ginger to Europe. The interview comes from a resource pack produced by CTA. Transcript Mensah I am Daniel A. Mensah and this is where we do our processing. This is our site, this is where we receive our ginger and then we process for exports. Domfeh So what do you consider when you want to dry these products? Mensah Yes what we consider is we need to have stages, we need to have labourers and then we need to get our necessary things for slicing and other things before we start our drying. Domfeh So what is involved in the drying of such produce? Mensah Actually, the only thing that we need is to get our stages ready, our plastic sheets and all the sacks ready for our drying and then after slicing we take it to the drying. When we dry we have people there as you can see yourself, they are disturbing the ginger like how they process cocoa and this should be a continual disturbance, maybe after three hours, every two hours they have to disturb the ginger so that it dries very quickly. It takes about three to four days to dry finally. You know we have to be very careful that we do not have any sun or any other bad materials within it so that it does not affect our international markets you know. Domfeh So talking about international market, what standards need to be met and how do you obtain certification, especially organic certification? Mensah Ok, concerning the international standards we have certifiers who will certify our produce throughout the world. We make sure that we have followed organic standards, to meet the standards. So this is where we store the fresh ginger and then here also we have about six women who work on sorting and then breaking of the ginger before we finally wash for slicing. So for now they have almost finished with the one that they have sorted out and they have also washed them all here. So we are coming to start some slicing right now. SFX (Moving towards drying area) Mensah We need to construct more stages, that is why we are even using the ground, the bare floor to dry the ginger. So we need more stages in order to expand our drying. Domfeh Is using the bare floor? is it ideal? Mensah That is why we have cleared all those spaces. We make sure that there is not anything that will contaminate the ginger. We lay the necessary things on the ground before we dry on it. Domfeh Can we get to the stand there to see basically what they are doing there? Mensah Yes of course we can. SFX Walking. Domfeh Good afternoon. Is it difficult to do? Worker But it is ok! Domfeh So what are they all doing here? Mensah As you can see this is where we dry. They have gathered the ginger, they are collecting the ginger, they have to transfer after one day to the ground so that we have enough space to slice more for drying. We are using the solar as you can see we are using the sun energy to dry that is why purposely this Harmattan season getting to the rainy season we would not be able to process ginger. But for now and what we are doing, the technology we are using with these little machines we are able to process the quantity of ginger we need per day. SFX (Washing the ginger) Domfeh So I can see the lady over there washing the ginger. Is it the ideal process? Mensah Yes, that is the ideal process. After washing with a washing machine we have to wash it for three times after which we dip it into hot water to kill the microbial all these things before we slice the ginger. So that is the ideal. Domfeh So that is why you have the fire over there burning? Mensah That is why we have the fire over there. We have boiling water. Domfeh So after washing she puts them inside this particular machine, what is this called? Mensah This is the washing concrete mixing machine as you can see but with our technology we have been able to use this thing to wash our ginger. So this is where we wash it first, it gets rid of all the sands and all the other particles before we transfer into the other bowls for them to wash with their hands. Because if they are supposed to wash with their hands alone it becomes very difficult to get rid of the sand particles and other things. Domfeh So from the machine it goes to? Mensah Yes, from the machine and washing here we go to the slicing. This ginger is completely washed and ready for slicing here. So this is our slicing machine and this slicing machine can slice over a hundred bags weighing 80 kilogrammes to 100 kilogrammes a day. Domfeh So from here it goes to the drying stand? Afterwards, what next? Mensah We package it, we put it in a nice package and then we put it at the warehouse until we get the total quantity that we need before we export it outside. Domfeh Does packaging mean a lot in this business? Mensah In our area I would say packaging it does not mean a lot but we need to be very strict because it is organic project. We need to make sure that what we are using to package does not have any contaminations and then we have our labels on it. Tera My name is Kojo Tera. Domfeh And what do you do here? Tera Actually, I am the administrative and finance officer for the company. Domfeh What sort of investment do you need to go into this business of drying produce? Tera Concerning investment, we need maybe all the necessary things for the processing of the ginger. Maybe we need slicing machine, we need the washing machine and also we need stages for drying and other materials for the drying. And also some equipment for our workers and other important things needed for the processing of the ginger. Domfeh For people who want to go into this sector of drying produce for exports what advice can you give to them? Tera My little advice for them you know if only it is for export because it is going outside we need to work very hard to meet the international standard because if it does not happen you have your product there but then it is going to be cancelled, nobody is going to buy it and it will be a waste and a whole lot of you know debt will come. So we have to be very careful, if anybody wants to enter into this the only thing we need to do is to try as much as possible to meet the international standard. End of track
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| Format: | Audio biblioteca |
| Language: | English |
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Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation
2008
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10568/57469 |
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