People venturing right into a food product industry ceaselessly encounter roadblocks. Getting the recipe right and guaranteeing longer shelf-life for the goods are a few of them. Though a simple web search may throw up a large number of answers to such problems, there’s nothing like getting it instantly from the pony’s mouth.
This is what the food processing industry incubator at the Post Harvest Technology Centre of the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU) has been doing for almost 13 years. The centre was once established in 2004 with the motive to reduce post-harvest losses by way of creating cost added merchandise from farm produce. A yr later, it started offering training programmes.
"Generally, during glut season, the price of a product drops drastically. In such times, farmers throw away perishable goods such as tomatoes. In order to reduce such wastage, we invite them and show them how they can produce value added products such as ketchup using tomatoes," says N Varadaraju, head of the centre.
The incubator at the centre offers per thirty days training programmes in food processing under eight units – juices, jams, ketchup, masalas, pickles, bakery merchandise, pasta and millet milling. "The centre offers two-day training programmes for a fee of Rs1,500 on how to prepare the products according to Food Safety and Standards Authority of India specifications. Through our research, we have brought out standard recipes which we teach," says G Gurumeenakshi, associate professor at the centre.
The centre additionally signs memorandums of figuring out (MoU) with people who want to get started their own food product ventures. Varadaraju says one of the vital participants of the per thirty days programmes would want to pursue it as a industry. "For a fee of Rs 10,000, we allow them to use the equipment at the centre’s master kitchen for one year. They can manufacture their products and also pack them at the centre. But they themselves have to take care of the marketing," he says. A complete of 12 MoUs are signed once a year, he provides.
Through its bakery unit, the centre trains other folks to make millet-based value- added merchandise comparable to bread and cookies. The bakery unit additionally makes other pieces comparable to desserts, buns and puffs, says P Vennila, professor at the centre, and in-charge of the bakery unit. It has a counter gross sales unit, the place the goods prepared by way of in-house workforce are bought.
Of the masses of other folks the centre has trained, around 30 have started their own ventures in Coimbatore and around the state and feature been functioning successfully, said officers at the centre.
This is what the food processing industry incubator at the Post Harvest Technology Centre of the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU) has been doing for almost 13 years. The centre was once established in 2004 with the motive to reduce post-harvest losses by way of creating cost added merchandise from farm produce. A yr later, it started offering training programmes.
"Generally, during glut season, the price of a product drops drastically. In such times, farmers throw away perishable goods such as tomatoes. In order to reduce such wastage, we invite them and show them how they can produce value added products such as ketchup using tomatoes," says N Varadaraju, head of the centre.
The incubator at the centre offers per thirty days training programmes in food processing under eight units – juices, jams, ketchup, masalas, pickles, bakery merchandise, pasta and millet milling. "The centre offers two-day training programmes for a fee of Rs1,500 on how to prepare the products according to Food Safety and Standards Authority of India specifications. Through our research, we have brought out standard recipes which we teach," says G Gurumeenakshi, associate professor at the centre.
The centre additionally signs memorandums of figuring out (MoU) with people who want to get started their own food product ventures. Varadaraju says one of the vital participants of the per thirty days programmes would want to pursue it as a industry. "For a fee of Rs 10,000, we allow them to use the equipment at the centre’s master kitchen for one year. They can manufacture their products and also pack them at the centre. But they themselves have to take care of the marketing," he says. A complete of 12 MoUs are signed once a year, he provides.
Through its bakery unit, the centre trains other folks to make millet-based value- added merchandise comparable to bread and cookies. The bakery unit additionally makes other pieces comparable to desserts, buns and puffs, says P Vennila, professor at the centre, and in-charge of the bakery unit. It has a counter gross sales unit, the place the goods prepared by way of in-house workforce are bought.
Of the masses of other folks the centre has trained, around 30 have started their own ventures in Coimbatore and around the state and feature been functioning successfully, said officers at the centre.
Training, hand-holding for entrepreneurs
Reviewed by Kailash
on
February 23, 2018
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