|
|
 |
 |
| Sunday, 19 October 2003 |
 |
|
 |
Business |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
|
Personality plus Nanda Kohona : Award winning performance by Pelham Juriansz
Ranfer Group, which has an annual turnover of two billion rupees, won three awards at the 11th Annual Export Awards 2002, conducted recently by the National Chamber of Exporters of Sri Lanka. Ranfer International (Pvt) Ltd Director Nanda Kohona was enthraled by the fact that his Group had bagged the coveted 'Most Outstanding Exporter' award at the ceremony. Qualifications The 45-year old former Thomian hockey player Kohona, who has 22 years of experience in the trade, was pleased with his company's achievements. He has followed a food technicians' course in Mysore, India in 1980, a diploma at the Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing and a business administration course at the University of Colombo. The Ranfer Group of Companies is led by a legal luminary, B.M. Amarasekera, and has as its Managing Director and Chief Promoter Nirmal Ranasinghe, who started his career in the tea trade in 1963 at the tender age of 18. In 1985, Ranasinghe together with the former successful Peterite cricket captain Travice Fernando founded Ranfer Teas. Ranasinghe and Fernando are considered by Kohona as his role models. Kohona joined Ranfer International as its Executive Director and continues to hold the responsibility of being its chief as well as undertaking trading in agro-based products on behalf of the Ranfer Group of Companies. Vision The vision of the company is to initiate and develop exports through innovation and creativity. This entails the usage of Sri Lanka's range of agro products that has attracted the commercial interest of trading through the passage of time. Mission The mission of achieving this concept into a practical reality was entrusted to Kohona. It was predominantly his single-handed effort in achieving this objective that directly facilitated in Ranfer achieving the award for the 'Most Outstanding Exporter'. Career Being a cadet in school no doubt instilled discipline into Kohona and he has carried this into his work. Having left school in 1978, he started his career as a Management Trainee, and then worked at E.B. Creasy and Co as a Production Executive. He then moved to Orient Food Processing as a Production Manager where he initiated a food processing factory, setting up a plant to can fruits and vegetables. From 1983-90 he was the Production Manager and Chief Operations Manager at Consolidated Business Systems from 1990-94. From 1995, to date he has been the Executive Director of Ranfer International. In 1999, he was invited to join the Board of Directors as the Group Director. The Ranfer History The Ranfer Group was primarily incorporated to export tea. Today, after 18 successful years, the Group comprises 10 companies in Sri Lanka. Its activities cover exports of a range of agricultural products, plantation ownership and management and value addition in respect of cocoa products, coconut products, dried lime and spices, karapincha and karawila among other products. The Group also has direct trading access to two companies in Malawi and Kenya. Its recent entry into the travel trade has given the Group's activities a new dimension. The Group includes Ruhunu Plantations (Pvt) Ltd and Ranfer Foods (Pvt) Ltd, involved in the marketing and distribution of food items, Ranfer Imports (Pvt) Ltd and Target Brands (Pvt) Ltd, which exports branded products, Local Retail Marketing, Kemulla Developments (Pvt) Ltd, and the recently opened Target Travels (Pvt) Ltd, headed by Bandula de Silva. The associate overseas companies are Target Brands Ltd, Malawi and Regency Teas Ltd, Kenya. Kohona said the group functions on a self-designed operational system. It has a central service specialised core group staffing as 'service providers'. All companies operate as profit centres, drawing the services of the core group staffing. This enables maximisation of the 'service providers' sector as well as infrastructure, thereby, lowering the unit overheads. The Ranfer Group has a staff of about 100, Kohona said. The company has ISO and HACCP certifications. Future Plans On his future plans for the company, Kohona said his vision is to convert the wide range of raw materials of Sri Lanka's agro products from a bazaar trade to a hygienically processed 'user friendly' raw material for processing upmarket food products. He is looking at the possibility of converting various agro produce into value added products. The local spice trade is very demanding with many opportunities. Kohona also mentioned the huge potential for desiccated coconut. "However, we expect government departments to work together on the Minor Export Crops sector, to which spices belong, and develop a national agricultural policy," he said. Kohona, who has attended many trade fairs abroad, said Lankan spices are very popular around the world. Some of the most prominent trade fairs he has attended are Anuga Fair in Cologne, SIAL in France, Fancy Food Fair in New York and trade fairs in South Africa and Kuwait. He has also travelled extensively.
|
|
News | Business | Features
| Editorial | Security Produced by Lake House |
Fact File
