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9/14/2013
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Cashew Nut Processing
Equipment Study Lesson from India
G Srivatsava
President, cashewinfo.com
Acknowledgement
We thank African Cashew Alliance
(ACA) for inviting us
Thank you all for your attendance
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Cashew Industry Snapshot
India processes about 1.5 million tonnes of RCN (0.7 million tonnes own
production and 0.8 million tonnes import during the year 2011-12)
It is almost 60% of the total RCN produced in the world (2.5 million
tonnes in the year 2011-12).
1991-2001 2002-2012
Avg annual RCN production (mt) 357,000 575,000
Avg. annual RCN imports (mt) 193,000 592,000
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Industry-size Classification
The Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Act, 2006 of
GOI classifies industries in manufacturing sector based on the
investments in plant and machinery.
Type Investment in plant and machinery (INR)
Micro scale 2.5 million
Small scale 2.5 million up to 50 million
Medium scale 50 million up to 100 million
(note, as of 10 September, 2013 one USD equals 63 INR).
As per this classification, most of the cashew processing industry in
India would fall under small scale industry category.
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Industry-size Classification
The machinery suppliers classify based on number of bags
processed.
Type RCN processed per day % units
Small Scale 25 bags 70 – 75%
Medium Scale 25 – 40 bags 15 – 20%
Large Scale over 40 bags 5 – 10%
Each bag of RCN equals 80 kg.
% units refers to number of units under each category
Large scale includes those who get the processing done through
various small scale units and do the final processing like grading,
sorting and packaging at centralized location
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Automatic RCN Processing in India
The concept is still confined to a few multinational large processors.
Average capacity of such plants is minimum 300 bags per day
which is unviable for the most of the medium size RCN processors in
India.
Unless one has a strong backward linkage (assured quantum supply
of RCN) and robust forward link (able to find bulk buyer at
remunerative price) and manage cash flows and price volatility, it
is difficult to own a fully automated plant.
A 100 bag/day RCN processing units (semi-automated) cost INR 20
Million (USD 0.33 million) (plant & machine including complete
installation) in case of automatic plant investment will grow further
to 5 times up.
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Processing Flow Diagram
PeelingPreperation of
cashew shellsDe-shelling Grading Packing
Weighing
filling
Gas flushing
Sealing
Sun drying
Cooking
Drumroasting
Steam cooking
Cooling
peeling by peeler macihine
HumidificationSemiautomatic
Cutting RCN by de-sheler
Scooping manually
sorting by seveing machine
Based on size and colour of kernels
sorting by color sorter
Grading
Drying
Drying
Cleaning
Indian still believes in judiciously combining Man and Machine in
Processing.
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RCN Cooking
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RCN Cooking
Traditionally, drum roasting method was used
Challenges: Loss of CNSL, Air pollution, Bad odor, Higher brokens,
Scotching of kernel
Recently, steam cooking has replaced drum roasting
Cookers were small in size initially, RCN feeding and unloading was
manual. Addressing requirements of medium / large scale processors
was a challenge.
Large capacity of steam cooker in which RCN is fed using bucket
elevators with conveyor belts to handle cooked RCN is the
innovation.
RCN grader/calibrator-cum-cleaner is additional mechanization in the
RCN pre-processing section
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What Processors Practice
Drum roasting is practiced in micro enterprises in remote villages.
Typically, handling one bag per day.
Typically Mild Steel (MS) vessels with a RCN carrying capacity of 320-
350 Kg (4 bags) are used
Vessels are coupled (fueled) with a boiler or other source of fuel like
firewood, nutshell cake and other burning material
A medium scale processor handling 2400- 3200 kg RCN/day will have
4-6 cooking vessels)
About 100-150 kg of fire wood would be required for heating boiler.
After cooking, cooked cashew nuts are allowed to cool down by
spreading in a room with proper ventilation for about 12-14 hours or by
keeping in a humidifier for about 1-2 hours.
Capacity of the boiler can be more if the units have provision to
attach dryers.
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De-shelling
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De-Shelling
In the past, Drum roasted RCNs were shelled or cracked using
wooden hammer.
Challenges: Time consuming, unhygienic, injury-prone and labour
unfriendly and lastly, steam cooked nuts are difficult to break using
hammer
Wooden Hammer was replaced by Hand and Pedal operated
cashew cutter. It was more convenient, but dealing with CNSL
during de-shelling is a concern, scooping is required be done
manually. Broken nut is <5% (as labour becomes efficient)
Auto-sheller is the next innovation. Electro-mechanical process
comes with high throughput (50 kg per hr whereas labour can do
similar quantity in day). Broken nut recovery is > 15% (best case
10%), unshelled nut recovery is 8-10% (best case 5%).
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De-Shelling
Indian processors use both manual as well as auto-shelling
Processors.
Lower nut counts (large sized nuts) are cut manually with an aim to
reduce brokens.
Calibrators are being used to deal with nut of different origin, so as
to improve efficiency and reduce brokens.
Higher broken percentage (10-12%) is observed in automatic
shelling compared to manual method of shelling (<6%).
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What Processors Practice
Indian processors will use both manual as well as auto-shelling
processors believe that there is higher percentage of broken (10-
12%) in machine type of de-shelling compared to manual method
of de-shelling (<6%).
There are two types of auto-shelling machine viz. 2 blade machine
having capacity of de-shelling 18-22 kg RCN in an hour and 4
bladed machines with capacity of shelling 30-35 kg of RCN per
hour.
Based on the capacity processors will add number of auto-sheller
required. The processors will divide the work based on the number
of labour available for various processing sections.
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Drying
Batch Dryers, operate on different sources of energy – Wood, electric
or steam driven.
Drying is a batch process, with both keeping and removing cashew
done manually (labour)
The latest technology is environment friendly, hygienic and helpful to
give uniform drying
Continuous dryer, though has a low running cost, is high investment
(with backward and forward links) besides not suitable for small
quantity15
What Processors Practice
In India, steam hot house or dryers with steam as the source of heat,
are mostly used for the purpose
After drying, processors that use peeling machine humidify the
kernels to enhance the moisture level (from 3% to 5-6%) so as to
minimise breakage while peeling.
The humidification, can be done in two ways by either spreading the
kernels under shade to absorb the moisture present in air or using
humidifier.
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Cashew Kernel Peeling
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Cashew Kernel Peeling
Peeling was done manually, sometimes using knife or sharp tool to
remove Testa
The sharp tool leaves scratch marks on the skin of cashew kernel,
which are considered lower in quality
Later with efficient drying, processors trained labour to do either
rubbing between the palm or finger but productivity is very less i.e. a
labour can peeled 12-15 kg or kernel in a day.
Introduction of machines to peel is one of the major breakthrough
Mechanical peelers can peel from 50 kg to 250 kg cashew kernel in
an hour, the kernel feeding has also developed from manual to
conveyor based and at the receiving end, extra conveyor is added
to sort unpeeled, partial peeled kernels.
Again, higher capacity is an issue to medium size of processor, as
they cannot have so much volume of kernel, so the capacity
remains unutilised.
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Cashew Kernel Peeling
Small capacity peelers are not so efficient is terms of peeled kernel
output (60-65%), in terms of broken large machine yield 8-10% and
lower capacity machine yield 12-15%, reloading of kernel to peeling
machine would enhance the chances of broken.
Small capacity machine cannot remove Testa inside U shape of the
kernel.
In some places, stringent labour laws come in the way of
introduction of mechanical peelers.
Ideal operating conditions used for minimizing brokens
Input moisture level 5 – 6%
Compressor air pressure- 6 bars
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What Processors Practice
In recent years due to scarcity of labors processors have
proportionately divided the total quantity to be peeled between
manual labors and machine peeling in order to maintain the factory
capacity on daily basis.
In the manual peeling, recovery of whole kernel is 80-82%, while in
the machine it is 72-75%.
Auto peeler comes with variable capacities starting from 50 kg/hr to
250 kg/hr of kernel,
Variable speed compressor is a new addition in the auto peeler as it
can control the power consumption by adjusting the speed
according to the peeling need.
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Cashew kernel Grading/Sorting
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Cashew Kernel Grading/Sorting
Industry uses whole cashew graders to separate all types of whole
kernels
The grader can be useful to grade the kernel only based on size not
color
Limited number of grading can be done using the grader
A separator which specially meant for grading the broken cashew is
very useful for the industry as different processed food segment have
demand for specific size of broken
Introduction color sorters is further value addition to grade the
kernels combined with size and colour.
Traditionally manual grading (mostly by women) is employed in
India, these labour can grade the kernels based on the size and
even colour.
Still the Indian processors are following this practice
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What Processors Practice
Initial grading of cashew is still done manually (whole) by women
Color sorter is used by large volume players and broken nut suppliers
Some units provide facilities to get color sorting on ‘job work ‘ basis.
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Cashew Kernel Packaging
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Cashew Kernel PackagingPacking is done mechanically using vita packing machine or
vacuum packing machine.
cashew kernels are packed in 25 lb metal boxes (made of tinplate)
and infused with carbon-dioxide to create the required inert
atmosphere for domestic markets.
Two 10 kg tin boxes are packed in a single carton which is a
standard SKU for bulk marketing of cashew.
The tin packaging is not allowed in USA and other countries hence
the bulk cashew kernel is packed in multi-layer plastic films.
Now the trend has changed to pack the cashew kernels in
“modified atmosphere packaging”.
This can be done by having a vacuum pack or infusing it with an
inert gas, such as nitrogen.
The packaging material is manufactured by using various
technology of Multilayer Co-extrusion with a blend of various HI-tech
polymers.
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Machinery Supplier SelectionThe small processors have said that price of the equipment is the
leading criteria followed by performance, capacity, after sale
service, maintenance and training
Medium and large scale processors performance is the major criteria
of selection followed by capacity, after sale service, power
consumption, maintenance and training. Price is least selecting
parameters among the medium and large processors
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What Indian processors believe?It makes business sense to blend labour and machines- why?
Cashew business in not corportised. Risk capital entirely belongs to
the entrepreneurs.
Risk management is the key in getting consistency profitability. In the
absence of market mechanisms such as futures, with pure bilateral
model, risk management is highly complex.
Working capital management is crucial as operating cycles are long,
especially when the production season is concentrated and
detached from the demand season. One way to manage working
capital is smaller plant size.
Lastly, unfortunately user industry discounts brokens and hence,
every processor tries to minimise brokens. Machines have not been
able to address this unique though skewed challenge.
Manpower comes with its own baggage, although processors have
mastered the art of managing it over decades. 27
Thank You
Visit our stall No. 8 in the Expo.
For details contact
Ms. Swapna, Mob +91 9342840609
[email protected], [email protected]
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