Cassareep exporter considers e-commerce
Stabroek News
February 5, 2004
Major products
Selling cassareep over the internet is just one strategy being considered to boost exports.
A local manufacturer says his market in the United Kingdom is small but he hopes to improve this by attracting internet shoppers.
Allan Major, owner of Major's Food Manufacturing at Victoria on the East Coast Demerara, makes pepper sauce and cassareep to export to the UK and Canada.
But he must first identify the nutritional value of the products, to state the amount of fat, protein, starch and salt they contain.
Major explains that buyers require products to be labelled with their nutritional values, and since he is unable to find this out he has been shipping in bulk.
For example, his cassareep goes to the UK and Canada in drums and the buyers then bottle and label it themselves. He adds that importing bottles just to send them out again is costly.
Major says he has since contacted a colleague at the University of Guyana to help identify the nutritional values. He notes that that the New Guyana Marketing Corporation was unable to offer him any assistance in this matter.
Despite the obstacles, Major plans to spend more on marketing this year.
But he mentions that the 30 per cent consumption tax for products sold locally makes up a big chunk of his operating cost. Meanwhile an exporter of okras, known locally as 'ochroes', started planting last August for the UK market but says it is a difficult business.
The okras are a different variety than those sold locally and the seeds are imported. These are 8 centimetres long when fully grown (smaller than local varieties) and are narrower. "It has a beautiful taste," he adds. They are not organic as this is said to be a difficult crop to grow without pesticide and fertiliser.
The okras end up in the West Indian markets with the buyers ranging from Carib-bean expatriates to Asians.
The exporter's main concern is finding more flights to the UK and he cautions that the business takes time to learn.
One UK-based Guyanese buys breadfruits from several Pomeroon farmers and over the past two months has shipped 380 breadfruits to London.
A source says the breadfruit is a good quality but farmers need to improve their post-harvest techniques in-cluding learning to pick them before they fall from the tree.