Silk Route Ventures initiates Sri Lanka’s first fully equipped food factory
Ada Derana: Understanding that setting up a food factory takes a colossal amount of investment and effort in this highly competitive environment and even more so amidst economic challenges, Silk Route Ventures, a leader in the nation’s agriculture, food and beverage and nutraceuticals segments, now allows culinary entrepreneurs and enthusiasts a launchpad to turn their creative ideas into successful products.
This plug-and-play approach enables one to create the next big food or beverage brand, without the hassle of heavy capital required. Housing a world-class commercial kitchen, the food factory located at the Silk AgTech Park at Hapugasyaya in Matale, provides one with a range of capabilities, from washing, peeling, cutting, and grinding to mixing, filling, retorting, spray drying, packing, and much more.
Its flexible production capacity allows one to begin with low minimum order quantities, with the ability to scale up commercially as the brand or product grows. One also has access to their talented and experienced in-house research and development team, who will work closely to conduct comprehensive tests and refine product ideas.
The factory has various international certifications under its belt, such as GMP, HACCP, ISO 22000, FSSC22000, USDA Organic and EU Organic, exhibiting its utmost and uncompromising passion towards quality, and adheres to some of the industry best practices in sustainable energy and environmental conservation.
Silk Route Ventures declared open this factory during mid last year to produce a healthy range of vegan and plant-based products, such as the signature vegan patty, which are now making strides in international markets, contributing to both the economy in forex and the livelihoods of local farmer communities including facilitating them with training and scientific know-how and adhere to Fairtrade policies. It is also the only facility in the country that manufactures powdered oat and rice milk.
Established in 2014, Silk Route Ventures today provides an end-to-end solution, from sourcing, manufacturing including OBM, packaging and labeling to shipping, logistics including last-mile delivery, spanning across 140 cities in over 15 countries, with a track record of exports to over 40 countries, for which it has earned consecutively earned national recognition.
OSL take:
The expansion of operations announced by Silk Route Ventures is an indication of the overall growth and expansion of Sri Lanka’s private sector. Despite challenging conditions faced due to the global pandemic and the economic crisis, most of Sri Lanka’s private sector recorded growth levels and profits. Many local businesses and even foreign businesses that have set up operations in Sri Lanka are currently engaged in further investments and expansion programmers. Sri Lanka’s geographical positioning in the Indian Ocean and the many trade agreements as well as trade concessions enjoyed by the country have also helped boost Sri Lanka’s private sector businesses. With Sri Lanka working towards becoming an emerging business destination in the South Asian region while improving the country’s ease of doing business environment, Sri Lanka presents a lucrative business/investment opportunity. Foreign businesses/investors could look at setting up base in Sri Lanka to engage with other countries in the region using the preferential treatment enjoyed by the country when trading in the region.
| Article Code : | VBS/AT/20230725/Z_12 |