The country’s leading hybrid rice producer, SL Agritech Corp., is now looking to venture into the production of other agricultural products starting with cavendish bananas.
In a chance interview during the AgriLink Expo held recently, SL Agritech chair Henry Lim Bon Liong said the company had started exporting bananas to countries in the Middle East as well as to China.
“We started it about six months ago. We are exporting four to five containers every week but we are not happy with that quantity. We want to reach 100 containers every week,” he said.
The company is currently getting its bananas from small and independent banana plantations in Davao, but Bon Liong said they were starting to plant their own produce in a plantation in Agusan del Sur.
The goal is to increase the company’s banana exports by the end of the year with the additional produce it would get from its own plantation, Bon Liong said.
Aside from the manufacture of hybrid rice seeds, rice varieties and bananas, SL Agritech has also introduced snacks like brown rice puffs and banana chips. It is also looking to export pineapples and mangoes.
Without giving any figures, Bon Liong said the company continued to post double-digit growth yearly but the goal, he said, was to double its revenue.
