Dawa Tshering – Bhutan Essence

In 2020, I began a food production and packaging business on a trial basis with one employee, with the sole intention of learning food processing methods, market opportunities, packaging ideas, and establishing a supply chain.

I used the latest food dehydration technologies like Greenhouse Solar Dryer (Tunnel Dryer) and Infrared Drying in the dehydration process with some guidance from the post-harvest centre and self-research to ensure high nutrition retention, long shelf life, authentic taste, and premium quality. In addition, to meet international standards, I ensured proper and high-quality packaging with all standard labeling. After a year, I could package over 15 dehydrated products and condiments. With the increasing demand for the products and our ability to establish a full-scale business, I now want to target the spice market, as Bhutan has a diverse range of premium-quality organic spices.

We faced challenges such as post-harvest transportation, logistics, and proper packaging; however, our team found solutions. Our plan for the future is to improve our post-production and packaging skills to improve the supply chain and digitize our procedures by creating a website.

Over 750kg of dehydrated vegetables (equivalent to 1.2 tons of fresh vegetables) were exported to Bhutanese in New York and parts of Australia. These achievements would not have been possible without the help of the Bhutan Foundation and Loden.