The Board of Investments recently approved the application of R-Ley Trading, based in Roxas, Palawan in the Philippines, as an expanding export producer of roasted cashew nuts.
R-Ley Trading, a small to medium enterprise (SME) participant, qualified under the Export Activities category of the 2017 Investment Priorities Plan (IPP).
The $152,000 expansion project involves the acquisition of a decorticating machine, shelling machine, sorting machine, and peeling and packing machines from Vietnam. The expansion will also allow the enterprise to process roasted whole cashew nuts.
“By acquiring new machines, the firm will increase its production by over 800 percent over five years. We should take advantage of cashew’s expanding potential for commercial production as there is a continuous demand for nutritious food products. Palawan should lead the way since it is considered as the country’s cashew capital,” Trade Undersecretary and BOI Managing Head Ceferino Rodolfo said.
R-Ley’s output stood at 11,250 kilograms of cashew nuts in 2016. In the first year of expansion, it targets to produce 20,000 kilograms and by the fifth year, output is expected to increase to 102,000 kilograms. Half of its production is for the domestic market with the rest to be exported to Japan.
The country is one of the top 10 cashew producers in the world. Cashew production in the Philippines totaled 216,398 metric tons (MT) in 2016, based on data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).
Palawan accounted for about 95 percent of the 2016 production with output of 209,181 MT.
Source: manilatimes.net
