Crops

Rice exports from Thailand, the world’s largest shipper of the grain, may gain more than expected this year, boosted by strong demand from the Middle East and Asia, according to the Thailand Ministry of Commerce.

Boon Kee (BK) Chew joined Nutriad as Regional Director Asia/Pacific recently. In his new role, he will coordinate sales activities in that region in close collaboration with the current staff.

Cert ID Europe has undertaken third party non GMO certification for the distribution, storage and handling of non GMO Soya lecithin for Lasenor Charbhuja, one of India’s growing suppliers of Soya to the European food sector.
The company has also become the first Indian Soya site to achieve Halal certification for its products through Cert ID Europe and the European Halal Development Association.
The rigorous non GMO certification offered by Cert ID Europe now enables Lasenor Charbhuja to supply soya lecithin to GM sensitive markets such as the Europe and Japan and Halal certification to Muslim markets.
Lasenor Charbhuja purchases Soybean lecithin from various approved vendors. Then export the soybean lecithin after processing, reconditioning and homogenizing. Each batch of Lecithin exported is PCR tested in Cert ID approved lab and issued with a Cert ID TCC based upon a result <0.1 per cent GM (35S, NPTII, Soy Mon 89788)
Parent company Lasenor based in Spain has been Cert ID Non-GMO certificated since 2005 and now produces 1500MT Non-GMO Soya lecithin per year.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is to help the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) scale up the use of biomass waste in the agriculture sector to meet its growing need for clean energy and food security.
The ADB Board of Directors has approved a regional technical assistance project that will be funded by a $4 million grant from the Nordic Development Fund along with counterpart financing of $600,000 from the governments of Cambodia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic and Viet Nam. ADB will administer the grant and carry out the project in the three countries. Biomass waste―such as rice husks and animal manure―is abundant in GMS countries but is not efficiently used as a source of clean energy or as fertilizer. At the same time, the growing practice of large-scale crop production for biofuel poses a threat to food security by reducing food production and forest land.
“Promoting more efficient use of biomass can simultaneously address the goals of fighting climate change and improving the well-being of the rural poor, which are often seen as competing priorities,” said Sununtar Setboonsarng, Principal Natural Resources and Agriculture Economist, in ADB’s Southeast Asia Department.