Setting Up And Running A Small Fruit Or Vegetable Processing Enterprise

If you are interested in starting up a business, food processing offers an excellent opportunity to generate income using locally available resources. Focusing on the establishment of such a business using fruits and vegetables, this detailed and informative manual covers topics such as: products and processes (bottling, drying and picking), potential markets, equipment, facilities and quality assurance. Issues involved in the mangagement of your business – health and safety, staffing issues, finances and business strategy – are also addressed in an easy-to-follow, practical way.

Whether you want to start a new business, or improve or diversify an existing operation, this unique text collects for the first time essential information on the demand for high-value foods, their production, marketing and quality management. Aiming to raise awareness of opportunities in high-value foods and ingredients in ACP countries, the handbook also highlights routes to access different types of value chains for these products. Clearly laid out, with helpful summaries and ‘tips for success’, this comprehensive publication presents numerous real-life case studies to inspire entrepreneurs to improve their production and profitability.

The result of a collaborative effort by small business owners and advisers in ACP countries, this manual covers everything you need to know about starting up and managing a small-scale cooking oil business. Helpfully illustrated with numerous tables, checklists and case studies, it highlights important aspects such as production, processing and quality control. Marketing, packaging, branding and customer care are also covered, along with invaluable advice on how to plan and manage finances.

This is the first in a series of manuals on small-scale food processing, compiled by contributors from several developing countries. Intended as a practical guide for people starting or operating a food business, it covers a range of topics including: hygiene, equipment, product testing, suppliers and retailers, and financial, production and staff management.

Small scale food processing can create diversified incomes and employement for farmers in rural villages. Processing brings many differenet benefits to communities: it allows foods to be preserved and stored as a reserve against times of shortage, it helps to avoid the effects of lowered prices when seasonal gluts occur at harvest time, it creates special foods for cultural idenity and it enables farmers to add value to crops and animal products that diversify and increase sources of income.