Kaiming Agro Processing Ltd has seen an increase in the demand for ginger since the pandemic started however it has been experiencing a shortage of supply for three years.
According to the managing director Calvin Qiu, the company has about 36 different kinds of ginger products as well as a few turmeric products exporting to markets such as North America Europe, UK, Australia, New Zealand.
“For the past three years we found there is a shortage of ginger supply both on the baby ginger and the mature ginger, especially on the baby ginger we have a huge shortage.
“We used to buy quite a bit of ginger from the year 2012 and 2013, I think in the year 2013 we bought around 1800 tonnes but this year I think we only bought around 1000.
“There was a decline but the demand for ginger especially our Fiji ginger was increasing from all the market, especially after COVID-19.”
He said a few scientists in UK had found through their research that ginger and turmeric had contents which could possibly address some of the symptoms caused by the COVID-19 virus as both were regarded as the anti-fermentation antioxidants, which could boost the immune system.
“So that’s why from March after the scientist in UK found ginger could combat the symptoms, the demand for ginger increased.
“And especially for our Fiji ginger we have a very good reputation in Europe, we have a few good buyers in the UK and they take the premium quality ginger compared to some originals.”
Fiji ginger was said to contain less heavy metals including lead because most of the soil was young and new.
Mr Qiu said it didn’t have much collusion caused by the fumes of big industries or factories.
“For example the emission from the cars which they fuel has got a lot of lead, at the end of the day its in the air and it will settle in the soil.
“So they come to the soil and the crop will absorb through the roots so it gets inside the crops,” he said.
“Our second advantage for ginger expected for this heavy metal is the chemical freeze.
“Like in some Asian countries they are planting this ginger for centuries because they keep on planting every year on the same soil so there are a lot of insects.”
He said these countries before planting they had to vary the chemicals insecticide in the farm and then plant the seeds.
“Otherwise the seeds may be eaten by the insects, so because of this and a lot of the uses of the insecticide it is very hard to satisfy the requirements of the European Union,” he said.
Mr Qiu said the UK market was a major market as their products such as ginger paste and glazed ginger were used in biscuit, energy bars as well as beverages.
“This year and last year we couldn’t satisfy their demand because we had to supply them with a certain quota.
“We plant organic ginger and the commercial ginger as every year we get around 150 tonnes of organic and another 120 tonnes of commercial ginger.”
Mr Qiu revealed last year they had exported up to $7.5 million of ginger mainly to the US, Europe, Australia and New Zealand as well.
“Also 95 per cent were ginger products which were mainly ginger candy, syrup ginger, sushi ginger and ginger juice.
“We have around 200 plus growers, we got a shortage of supply for the past three years, we have to see, from our company alone we are short from a 1000 tonnes.”
He said they would need about 100 more farmers to meet this shortage. The business started from 1999 with the ginger plantation in Navua however Mr Qiu said they later found out there was an issue with access to those markets.
“So from the year 2005 we started our own small ginger procession plant in Navua and with the government assistance in the year 2009 we built our current factory and which were commissioned by our honourable prime minister in the year 2010.
“All these years we started small and then step by step we grew to our current scale.
“Currently we were doing ginger and turmeric but before that we were also doing taro and cassava processing and exporting.
“We used to do around 1800 tonnes of taro and cassava every year and export it to Australia and New
Zealand and now since the year 2016 we only focus on the ginger and the turmeric,” he said.
