The steady growth of the agro-processing sub-sector of modest activity with little respect mainly used to subsidize the income of poor families to what are, in some cases, significant investments in locally-grown fruit ingredients. and vegetables and vegetables are arguably one of the recent notable successes in the agro-processing sector.
It was a time when agro-processing products were mainly sold in hastily wrapped paper and plastic packaging and from bottles that often raised questions about the cleanliness of the products’ own bona fides. How things have changed! Nowadays, the manufacture of these fruit and vegetable-based snacks, condiments and seasonings is subject to the strict food safety supervision protocols enshrined in law; so that even the smallest ‘manufacturer’ of agro products, these days, has to comply with factory, delivery and cleanliness standards at least subject to enforcement and contravention which can be punished by imposed sanctions are overseen by state agencies such as the Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS) and the Government Department’s Food and Drug Administration Analyst. (GA & FDD)
If the efforts of the country’s agro-processing sub-sector are not always crowned with success, some of these, with their rapid adherence to high standards of product quality and presentation, do more than measure up to what is required.
Dr. may have. Portia Dodson-Sammy more than adequately qualified in microbiology and medicine to accompany an MBA he obtained from the University of Guyana. Despite those qualifications, there is no doubt that she prefers to speak on her ability as an agro processor. Not that her self-assessment left her work in health sector management with the local Ministry of Health. The simple truth, however, is that she wants her life’s activities to leave a much more indelible mark on human health and entrepreneurship. Heartsmart Enterprise, the company she founded along with her husband in November 2019 puts her closer to achieving that goal.
Heartsmart Enterprise’s products, six of them – Garlic Puree, Smoked Garlic Puree, Spicy Garlic Puree, Garlic Puree and Pimento, Ginger Puree and Jerk Seasoning – embrace sensitivity to the importance of pleasing culinary ingredients as an integral Guyanese aspect and cause for the ingredients to remember the axiom of healthy eating. If someone was challenged to choose a slogan that could sum up the spirit of Dr.’s creations. Dodson-Sammy is best, probably something like “healthy food can be delicious.”
In manufacturing its products, it weighs in to serve well-known raw materials including garlic, ginger and olive oil, all of which have been proven to “reduce cholesterol and promote optimum functioning of the cardiovascular system.”
Its six products are marketed in glass jars and decorated with labels that are striking enough to rank among those who stand out in what is, nowadays, a packaging and labeling field grown in leaps and bounds.
Putting the labeling role aside as a marketing tool, Dr. Sammy decorates product label surfaces with sensible messages that encourage customers to “get active, eat well and control their blood pressure.”
Heartsmart, the company’s Proprietrix, had never had a formal launch. To date Facebook has largely driven product marketing. The company’s factory is located at 173 Sunflower Circle, South Ruimveldt. These days, she is interested in embracing the challenge of undertaking some of the marketing. The ‘journey,’ however, has been challenging. The COVID-19-driven locksmiths have compromised many of the planned ‘taster trips’ to local restaurants that had been on the cards. These can be ‘on the back burner’ for the time being although they are by no means off the table. She said that engagement with a local distributor, “didn’t work out” even though her products had successfully ‘shelved’ the major supermarkets in Georgetown.
A passionate self-confessed believer in product delivery, he worries that the continued promotion of its products does not suffer continually because of the shortage of attractive containers it has chosen to package. She has already experienced temporary shortages of her preferred jars due to cargo movement restrictions originating from COVID-19. That had curtailed some or all of her sampling plans and she wants not to repeat that episode.
Dr. Sammy-Dodson is more than a little optimistic that the point of sale that provides a link between a tasty product and healthy eating he has created will go a long way toward growing his customer base. If its current focus is largely on the wider popularization of the unique range of flavors it believes to have created, it does not give the impression that exploring the possibility of an external market ‘is off the cards . ‘ That seems to have to come later, though.