Demand for spices is ever-growing, especially due to their medicinal properties and widespread use in cooking.
Spices such as peppers, turmeric, ginger, cinnamon, cumin, cloves, garlic and cardamom are the main ingredients of many fast foods, sauces, drinks, breads and cookies.
Iranians consume 220,000 tons of spice every year, 170,000 tons of which are imported. The country, however, is only capable of annually producing 50,000 tons of five spices, namely cumin, caraway, paprika, sumac and angelica.
The Persian daily Forsat-e Emrooz recently published an article on setting up a spice production line in Iran and the sector’s investment potential.
According to Elaheh Elahi, sales manager of Sabziran Company, a spice production line can be established in Iran with as much as $13,000 of initial capital.
A plot of land with an area of at least 1,000 square meters is required to set up the factory and nearly 20 workers are needed, including as assistants, machine operators and managers. She added that the process of grinding spices builds up a considerable amount of dust, therefore it is recommended to set up the factory outside city boundaries and install large industrial fans in the vicinity.
The machinery required are hammer mills, blade grinders, blenders and a sachet packaging machine. The process comprises grinding the spices, which are usually in the form of woodchips or seeds, and then transferring them to the packaging machine to wrap them in PET packages made from recyclable polyethylene terephtalate.
Elahi noted that the production apparatus are all domestically manufactured and can be easily obtained at reasonable prices. Spice production can be a profitable business as it requires a small initial capital to start with. However, in order to guarantee a competitive edge in the market, the output must be more than 10 kg a day of high quality and product diversity.
According to Elahi, this can be achieved by increasing investment, producing unique spice blends for popular dishes and using modern designs in packaging.
“Producing spices that are already out there and offered by other companies may yield profits for a year or two, but innovations have to kick in or you will lose out to other rivals,” she concluded.
