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Varieties of tea and alternatives to sugar dominate tea and coffee expo
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Friday, 22 November, 2019, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Vijetha Iyer, Mumbai
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The seventh World Tea and Coffee Expo commenced at the Bombay Convention and Exhibition Centre in Mumbai on Thursday. The three-day event was inaugurated by Saud Al Mazrouei, director, Sharjah Airport International Free Zone Authority, Government of Sharjah, UAE.
Among the highlights of the opening day was a multi-session seminar with renowned speakers throwing light on the different aspects of tea and coffee business. The speaker at one of the sessions was tea consultant Parveez Arshad Hussain. He said, “The Government of Arunachal Pradesh is implementing Mission Organic Value Chain Development for the North-East Region (MOVCDNER) and a Centrally-Sponsored Scheme (CSS). Also, today we are exhibiting exotic teas by seven producers, led by Techi Hemu, general secretary, Small Tea Growers’ Association.”
The next speaker of the day, Bhavani Swaminathan, founder, Aakanksha: Desire for Wellness, said, “Rather than the normal sugar which we consume, we can use natural and organic sugar, which is good for health. The healthy alternatives for sugar are mishri, date sugar, raw honey, jaggery, etc.”
She was followed by Bhushan Yengade, food industry consultant, Binder Technology Consultancy. He said, “The Government of India, at all levels, announces welfare schemes for a cross-section of society from time to time. These schemes could be either Central, state-specific or a collaboration between the Centre and the state.”
He added, “The main objective of the scheme is creation of processing and preservation capacities and modernisation or expansion of existing food processing units with a view to increasing the level of processing, value addition leading to reduction of wastage.”
Yengade said, “The setting up of new units and modernisation of existing units are covered under the scheme. Also, in Europe, 29 million tonne of dairy products are lost or wasted every year for various reasons.”
Meanwhile, Harki Sidhu, co-ordinator, India, livelihoods, sustainable agriculture division, spoke about the necessity of mechanical harvesting in tea for small growers to improve quality and reduce costs. Stating that the production of small growers’ production would cross 50 per cent by 2021, he warned that if the quality did not improve, tea exports from India would decline, and so would the market.
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