eBusiness Weekly
Michael Tome
HARARE – Indigenous agro-processing company,Davipel Group, has embarked on a $2 million dollar instant yoghurt and flavouring plant investment with a target to commission by April next year.
The company which already is into corn snack manufacturing, maize-meal and stock feed production is mulling the production of low-priced instant yoghurt.
Speaking in an interview, Davipel Holdings Group Managing Director Davison Norupiri said his company intends to come up with affordable instant yoghurt which will be rightly priced for ordinary populace, adding that the product will be fit for boarding school students and the plant is expected to be launched early 2019.
“As Davipel we have seen that yoghurt is a product that everyone wants but is classified under luxuries, as a result it’s more on the expensive side. Our target market is average Zimbabweans, mainly children, mostly at boarding schools considering the packaging which is easy to store.
“Therefore we are going to come up with a very cheap yoghurt in powder form that will be mixed with water to come up instant yoghurt. We are getting our equipment from South Africa and we expect to commission the plant in April next year,” said Mr Norupiri.
Turning to the flavouring side, Mr Norupiri noted that the new investment was motivated by the recently commissioned agro-milling plant’s ability to produce seventy percent flavour base which is nearly three quarters of the required ingredients.
“We have discovered that our new agro-milling plant can manufacture the flavor base which is about 70 percent of what is required in the flavours. Which translate to 30 percent import of the remaining ingredients required in making flavours.
Davipel was last week awarded the 21st edition Southern Africa Ernst and Young entrepreneur of the year prize after it emerged victorious in the exceptional category to walk away with the coveted prize after completing rigorous interviews and scrutiny from a final shortlist of four individual entrepreneurs that consisted of three South African companies.
