Rotting Produce Means Big Potential

Mark Aulik can imagine a time in the near future when fruits and vegetables from India will be a common sight in American grocery stores. The president of Jordan-based Alloy Hardfacing & Engineering Company, Inc., sees a lot of potential for his company and others to make a mark on the Indian market, one of the biggest producers of fruits and vegetables in the world. The company manufactures equipment used in the food and food-processing industries.

Indian growers produce huge volumes of fruits and vegetables, but the U.S. Commercial Service estimates that nearly 30 percent of those foods rot before they make it to market because of the lack of cold-storage and transportation facilities—cold-storage rooms, refrigerated containers, and refrigerated trucks. Some experts say the percentage that goes to rot is much higher.

“In other words, they’re not able to store them or process them fast enough to get them to market, so therefore, they rot,” Aulik says. “In a country where somewhere less than 50 percent of the population can eat a balanced diet on a regular basis, that is just short of criminal.”

Aulik sees tremendous opportunity for his company in solving this problem. Alloy Hardfacing has already sold two pieces of machinery in India that clean wastewater from meat-processing facilities. He’s exploring the idea of marketing a sort of portable high-tech tent that could serve as cold storage. He traveled to India as part of Minnesota’s first trade mission there in November, and made separate trips to meet with potential partners thereafter.

During the trade mission, Governor Tim Pawlenty stressed that Minnesota companies have major opportunities in food processing and cold-food storage. Many agree that the potential for Minnesota companies in the food-processing and storage sectors will be strong, though obstacles remain.

Keeping Cool

I think there’s explosive growth potential there,” says Sri Zaheer, associate dean for faculty and research at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management. Some companies already are exploring possibilities. Although big opportunities await, Tony Lorusso, executive director of Minnesota’s Trade Office, says “we’re still pretty much in the infancy” of developing the cold-food storage and transportation market in India.