Category: Process

Tarragon is popularly employed as a flavoring agent, especially in the Mediterranean cuisines. It is known for its slightly bittersweet flavor, with an aroma similar to anise and is rich in phytonutrients as well antioxidants that help promote health and prevent diseases.

Tarragon is rich in numerous health. Some of these benefits are:

• Drinking tarragon tea can help those with insomnia. It has a calming effect
• Chewing the leaves can help relieve pain, especially in the mouth or tooth. Tarragon tea also has the same effect.
• It is very rich source of vitamins such as vitamin-C, vitamin-A as well as B-complex group of vitamins such as folates, pyridoxine, niacin, riboflavin, etc., that function as antioxidant as well as co-factors for enzymes in the metabolism.
• It is an excellent source of minerals like calcium, manganese, iron, magnesium, copper, potassium, and zinc. Manganese is utilized by the body as a co-factor for the antioxidant enzyme, superoxide dismutase. Iron is essential for cellular respiration (co-factors for cytochrome-oxidase enzyme) and blood cell production.
• It has been used in various traditional medicines for stimulating the appetite and as a remedy for anorexia, dyspepsia, flatulence, and hiccups.
• The essential oil, eugenol in the herb has been in therapeutic use in dentistry as a local-anesthetic and antiseptic for toothache complaints.
• Tarragon can help maintain a healthy female reproductive tract, and may also help women deal with suppressed menstruation
• Tarragon is a vermifuge, meaning it can help expel parasitic worms from the intestines. As a result, this lowers your risk of developing intestinal ailments and malabsorption.

 

Dill (Anethum graveolens) is an annual herb in the celery family Apiaceae. The herb has been used for culinary and medicinal purposes for hundreds of years. Both the seeds and the leaves can be used. While it is possible to buy and use dried dill, dill is one of those herbs that loses its flavor rapidly, so fresh is always your best choice.​

Dill can be a perennial or annual herb, depending on where it is cultivated in the world. This herb is used in almost every continent to different extents. It can be used dry as a topping for a number of meals, but it is also used as an ingredient in many meals.

Health benefits

• Promotes Digestion: Dill itself is an appetizer, and therefore extensively used in culinary applications. The essential oils present in it are stimulating and they activate the secretion of bile and digestive juices.
• Provides Antimicrobial Effects: Dill has been shown to fight fungi, bacteria and mold, serving to fight fungal and bacterial infections.
• Lowers cholesterol: dill lowers bad cholesterol, blood glucose levels and lipid profiles.
• Boosts immunity: Dill has long been associated with antimicrobial activity. It has been shown to prevent a number of microbial infections throughout the body, those in various organs and those potential infections that land in wounds or small cuts on the skin.
• Prevents cancer: antioxidants in the essential oils of dill also contribute to this cancer protection that people enjoy from adding dill to their diet.
• May treat Epilepsy: Research shows dill leaf extract has anticonvulsant effects, which may help treat epilepsy.
• Boost Energy & aids Digestion: The fatty acids in dill weed improve digestion and supply energy to the body.

Dill weed is extremely beneficial and safe for most people, and it’s more versatile than just making dill pickles. You can use it in salads, dips, dressings and a whole other host of recipes, all of which help you receive some of the amazing dill benefits.

Since dill weed may help reduce menstrual cramps, reduce depression, lower cholesterol, act as a natural bug repellent, treat epilepsy, provide a source of energy, aid in digestion, contain antimicrobial effects and protect against free radicals, it’s something you should add to your diet today.

We can never forget what one customer told us during his first visit to Elmas Greens. He said ‘get the temperature out of the product’. Years later, we can confidently assert that solving the temperature problem is simply fixing a major problem for baby vegetable and herbs alike.

The entirety of the veg and herbs value addition chain is somewhat established upon temperature control, and by extension, temperature monitoring, perhaps equally if not more than delivering the said product. It is virtually impossible to separate success in baby vegetable, exotics and fresh herbs from the irrevocable requirement to control temperatures.

The underlying concern that necessitates temperature control is not only good visual appearance of the product but even more importantly, the formation and reproduction of pathogens and microorganisms that are/would be harmful to the consumer.

EC Regulation 852/2004 contains a general requirement for temperature control. The excerpt below is from Annex II, Chapter IX, 5, as follows:

Raw materials, ingredients, intermediate products and finished products likely to support the reproduction of pathogenic micro-organisms or the formation of toxins are not to be kept at temperatures that might result in a risk to health. The cold chain is not to be interrupted. However, limited periods outside temperature control are permitted, to accommodate the practicalities of handling during preparation, transport, storage, display and service of food, provided that it does not result in a risk to health.

By the application of different good food handling practices, it becomes apparent that products handled under proper temperatures always outlive those handled in either ambient or harsh temperatures.

Of very key importance is consistency in temperature control. Once the product has already been introduced to low temperatures, taking it out of that condition helps initiate and accelerate the formation and multiplication of microorganisms which deteriorate the quality of the product.

 

Traceability. Sometimes referred to as track and trace.

Several years ago, nobody really cared to ask where groceries came from – except of course where some prejudice or preference exists with products from particular geographical regions. Other than that, as long as the visuals were appealing to the consumer or agent, they would just pick what they find on the shelf, pay for it and take it home.

But that has since been overtaken by time, and this is for two key reasons.

The first of course, in the eyes of the grower, is the hunger for feedback in the business scene today. Many commercial growers today will want to know what their output is like, and so calculate return on investment that is traceable to farm subdivisions/blocks. Exporters also implement traceability to track the performance of their growers, in terms of how their raw material packs or performs.

But the more important reasoning behind track and trace is an industrial need to be able to tie the safety of food to its source. Following many issues to do with chemical residues being found in food, especially in the European market, need arose to seek both root causes of such issues, as well as come up with corrective actions that would be effective because they are implemented at the specific source of the product that was found to have safety concerns.

It has therefore become a practise for many serious growers and exporters in the market to have not only a trace code visible on the least pack size of the products they supply, but also to have such codes only as a visible part of a very elaborate traceability process, which in many cases is dictated in such a dealer’s Food Safety manual.

Good growers also go a step further to repeatedly train and sensitize their teams at their different levels of production on traceability – why it is important, as well as providing simple, clear ways to ensure that track is never lost for any product unit that gets to the market.

 

Crop protection is a collective term given to the methods employed by farmers to get rid of pests and diseases that invade their crop. The world today has and continues to invent new and better ways to ensure that crops are well protected from enemies. So it is a whole array of options – ranging from traditional scarecrow methods to modern methods which are powered by technology and data analytics.

It can be argued that today’s crop protection is not only advanced but also more sustainable than it was at any point in history – and it only keeps getting better!

The catch with food crop protection, specifically food meant for export is in the sensitive balance between food safety and phytosanitary standards, since aesthetics most matter when food is being exported. Global Standards of food safety and phytosanitary standards have made crop protection and ultimately post-harvest handling key pillars of the business that is horticulture.

So discussions revolving around Pre Harvest Intervals, Maximum Residue Levels, ‘allowability’ of pesticides in different markets, biological methods of crop protection, crop block border management, etc., have become key concerns in the market.

As well, the choice of pesticides, what combinations to use on which crops and at what stages have become crucial to the farmer upstream, because for example, while each pesticide is useful on its own, combinations tend to work better. For example, using one solution alone could encourage resistance of that solution among species of the target enemy. As such, which combinations to use, and on which crop, and grown in what climatic conditions become important topics.

A horticultural produce farmer who succeeds in his trade is one who comprehensively understands crop protection and applies this knowledge to churn quality products into the market – products which are both safe and visually attractive for the export market.