Project: Establishment of low-cost facility for the preservation and processing of fruits and vegetables in Kolar for women.

Funded by:  Council For Advancement of People's Action and Rural Technology

Project Duration:  June 1998 - June 2000

TIDE has completed this project with financial support of Council For Advancement Of People's Action and Rural Technology (CAPART). This project involved the setting up of a low cost facility for the processing and preservation of fruits and vegetables. The processing facility has been set up in Minjenahalli village in Mulbagal taluk. The Grameena Mahila Okkuta, a rural based women's organization in the village is associated with TIDE in this project

The construction area located on the land of Grameena Mahila Okkuta is equipped with basic equipment like the steam jacketed kettle, pulpers, drier, juicer, size reduction equipment etc. necessary for processing of fruits and vegetables. It is connected to a 3 phase 5 HP power supply. It also has a bore well in its vicinity. Trial production for the dehydration of tomatoes on a large scale has been initiated. A training programme in the production of pickles from Tomato, Ginger, Green chilly and tamarind has been started.

The lessons learnt from this project are:

• Local level value addition for horticultural produce needs distinct new linkages to be built and sustained for marketing of the produce. 
• The time required for a such a facility to be sustained is high and cannot be achieved in a short time period. 
• Linkages also need to be built up for procurement of raw material. 
• Packaging of finished products is important not only from the point of view of aesthetics but also for increasing the shelf life of the products.