Campco to crush cocoa for Jindal

In an effort to salvage its chocolate division, the Mangalore-based Central Arecanut and Cocoa Marketing and Processing Co-operative Limited (Campco) has entered into an agreement with Jindal to crush 175 metric tonnes of cocoa beans per month.

The order will be executed from October this year. This will fetch Campco a revenue of Rs 1.37 crore, said Campco's managing director Madhusudhan Rao.

Initially, Campco will crush 1,000 metric tonnes for Jindal. In addition to the above, Campco will crush 150 metric tonnes of its own beans every month.

This will result in the products of cocoa butter and powder. Jindal will export the cocoa butter and sell the cocoa powder in the domestic market. Last year, Campco earned Rs 55 lakh from Jindal.

As a cost control measure, he said, Campco has reduced the distributors' commission by 1 per cent to 5 per cent for finished and semi-finished products. Cash discount measure has also been reduced by 1 per cent.

This amount will be utilised to display Campco's products in dispenser boxes. It has a programme to have 5,000 dispenser boxes this year. "Our aim is to earn profit by the end of March 2007," he said.

Campco also aims to export its drinking chocolate powder under the 'Winner' brand name to Africa through a Hong Kong-based company. It proposes to export 200 metric tonnes of Winner per annum which would fetch the company an income of Rs 1 crore, he said.