CIC invests in Rs 400m vineyard
Gets 500 acres in Northern Province:
Shirajiv SIRIMANE
CIC Agri Businesses will invest Rs 400 million to construct Sri
Lanka’s only mass production vineyard. The vineyard will come up in the
Northern Province.
MD Keerthi Kotagama |
The company will obtain a 500 acre land on a long term lease to put
up the vineyard and also grow grapes. He said CIC conducted several
feasibility studies for this project and they were very positive.
CIC Agri Businesses (Private) Limited Managing Director Keerthi
Kotagama said a team from CIC will visit Portugal next week. “We will be
visiting a vineyard, a grape plantation an also study the wine industry
in Portugal during this tour,” he said.
He said the company is always on the lookout to venture deeper in the
agricultural sector and look at unused opportunities.
“With tourism booming we saw an opening for the wine market and
decided to invest in it,” he said.
He said they are hoping to invest around Rs 300 million for the
vineyard and a further Rs 100 million for the grape plantation. Hybrid
grape seeds will be imported from Israel and will be distributed to
outgrowers while the machinery will be from Europe.
Sri Lanka imports over 90 percent of its grapes mainly from Australia
and India and nearly 99 percent of wines.
Today an imported kilogram of grape is priced around Rs 1,200 while a
bottle of wine is over Rs 2,000.
He said when this project is launched they could provide red and
white wines and grapes less than 75 percent of the current prices.
They are looking at the supermarket chain to market their products.
CIC currently manages over 10,000 acres of its own farm land, works
directly with over 20,000 rural farmers and produces a variety of
agriculture and livestock products like seed paddy, rice, fruits,
vegetables, eggs, yoghurt and curd.
“The company has been very successful in the outgrower concept where
seeds and assistance is provided to farmers to grow fruits and
vegetables. “We want to introduce the same concept in the North as
well,” Kotagama said.
He said they will initially grow both red and green grapes to
manufacture Red white wine for the local market and then look at exports
to the Maldives. “We will also look at manufacturing champagne in the
future.” [email protected] |