Spice industry:

2011: Year of Value Addition

by Surekha GALAGODA

Year 2011 was declared the year of value addition in the spice industry by Agriculture Minister Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena at the seventh annual general meeting of the Spice Council held last week.

Minister Abeywardena said that the government was targeting to make the spice industry a $ one b industry with value addition by the year 2020.

He said that our country has some of the best spices in the world but the volume was not sufficient to cater to the growing demand.

Therefore steps were being taken to increase volumes which include the semi industrialisation of the peeling process under a grant of $ 100 m from the Japanese government as a solution to the shortage of cinnamon peelers. To achieve the export target of earning $ one billion by 2020 the government has begun helping farmers as well as exporters. Chairman of the Spice Council, D.A. Perera proposed the start up of a Central Research Laboratory for experiments and laboratory tests that have to be conducted for the evaluation of quality of the value added spices as well as for research and development purposes.

He said that the Spice Board of India supports industrialists with financial assistance and technical know-how for continuous growth in the sector to meet international demand.

Sri Lanka too should move in this direction and the Spice Board of India can be consulted for assistance, he said.

Perera said that the industry is in the process of establishing a central processing unit for cinnamon. The industry will also commence 100,000 plant nursery in Kosgoda by May next year while another nursery to grow vanilla and nutmeg will commence in Kegalle.

In addition 15,000 plants of Savandara were distributed among the farmers recently, he said.

In the event 500-1,000 acres of Savandara is grown oil can be extracted. The program is supported by the USAID.

At present tender nutmeg is plucked to produce oil.

This should stop immediately.

The world market for pepper is 250,000 tons while Sri Lanka exports 10,000 tons which is preferred as the piperine content is high in Sri Lankan grown pepper.

Perera said that due to the climatic conditions of the country we are in a position to grow 10 varieties of pepper which are value added end products for the food and flavour industry.

He said that since most of the pepper is exported raw, the council recommends imposing a development levy for LB grade pepper to develop the industry.

There are many plants which can be grown in the country to be used as raw material for cosmetics.

This will help increase the foreign exchange earned from the spice industry.

Saffron and ginger has a good demand from overseas but we import most of it.

By growing and exporting kolias to Japan a farmer can earn Rs. 400,000 every six months as it is of high demand.