Leena Gokhale, having worked with the IT sector in the India and abroad for more than a decade, is busy supervising these days the packing of Amla Herbal Tea at the small manufacturing plant located at Kanjale village, about 40 km from Pune city. It all began in 2007, when Leena who had a history of acidity problem decided to venture into the manufacture of the caffeine-free Amla tea which helps in dealing with the ailment.

?We had no idea about agriculture,? Leena admitted candidly. She got the idea of Amla tea from her mother-in-law, who uses herbal medicines for treating common ailments. However, with plenty of Amla available in and around Kanjale village, Leena and her ex-colleague Sandeep Pathak decided to buy about three acres of land in the village about three years back.

With the investment of around Rs 30 lakh, mostly from the personal savings of both Leena and Sandeep, their company Healthy Habits has recently started to supply Amla teabags to a mall in Pune. The duo has employed five people for manufacturing herbal tea and sourcing raw material. Their plan is to introduce more natural products in the market in the coming years.

With no background in food processing industry, the support provided by the cluster development programme of the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) came in handy for both Leena and Sandeep. ?They have supported us in identifying the machinery for packaging and financed a portion of the cost ,? Sandeep said.

The Apex Cluster Development Services Pvt Ltd (ACDS), the company that is implementing SIDBI?s cluster development programme, helped both the former techies in registering their company and brand, along with getting the bar code.

Similarly, in another part of Pune called Lohgaon, Sangeet Bagul, a housewife, has tied up with seven other ladies from her neighbourhood to manufacture varieties of pickles, juices and other food items. The tiny unit named Ruchi Food Products Ltd operates from the rooftop of her modest two-storey building. Now the company supplies packaged food items to most of the outlets of retail major Big Bazar in the city.

After the earthquake struck Bhuj in 2001, the traumatised Bagul, who had to leave the town and her husband, who was serving in Indian Air Force (IAF), for her home town. She was too scared to venture into any business. She had to leave Bhuj as it became a non-family station for IAF after the earthquake.

Later, with her savings of around Rs 10,000, she started to supply pickles and food items to her neighbourhood about five years ago. Thanks to a loan worth Rs 6.85 lakh (with a subsidy component of 30%) from the Khadi and Village Industries Commission, she invested about Rs 3 lakh in buying the machinery for packaging her products.

With her earnings of around Rs 20,000 to Rs 25,000 per month at present, she does not find it difficult to pay her monthly EMI of Rs 8,500. ?I have already paid back a major portion of the outstanding loan and am eager to scale up my units further,? Bagul said. She said that talks with other retail majors are on for supplying quality, homemade food products. Besides, she has got a contract for supplying mid-day meal to a nearby high school which fetches her about Rs 17,000 per month. ?Apex helped me find suitable market for my products besides getting the mandatory bar code and brand and company registrations,? Bagul said, referring to ACDS. Due to support from ACDS, she has already registered her brand Harsman.

Under the business development services (BDS) for micro, small & medium enterprises (MSME), SIDBI is implementing the project for capacity addition of the existing BDS providers in key clusters . The projects aims to enhance the growth, competitiveness and employment generation of MSMEs.

?Most micro enterprises cater to the market in and around Pune and thus, they run their units only for around 8-10 months a year,? Shubhada Shintre, cluster development manager, ACDS, said. Shintre said these units need support in the areas of training, accessing information, technology development, access to a larger market and credit.

According to Mukesh Malhotra, president, Maratha Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Agriculture, there are estimated to be around 1,200 to 1,300 mostly micro enterprises in the food processing sector in the Pune region alone. There are close to 600-700 registered units, bedsides a number of unregistered units in the cluster, mainly producing fruit & vegetable products such as fruit pulp, squash, sauce, jams, spices and other ready-to-cook-and-eat products.

?Food processing units in Pune need to vastly improve their quality, sourcing and management for expanding the market,? Malhotra said. With the setting up of the Food Safety & Standards Authority, small enterprises now need to invest a lot on packaging and testing of their products so that consumers can get access to quality products.

In the Pune region, there are plenty of agricultural and horticultural products such as sugar, fruits, vegetables, etc. This has resulted in the mushrooming of food processing units and they supply mostly to urban markets such as Mumbai, Nashik, Nagpur, Aurangabad.

Because of the support from SIDBI under BDS programme, a mobile testing laboratory has been introduced in Pune that would pick up samples from small units for testing their products on various parameters such as pesticide residues (in case of sugar-based products), nutritional levels, moisture, impurities like arsenic content, presence of solid wastes, etc. ?Small units do not have the financial power to test their products for so many parameters,? said Vasudha Keskar, managing director, MAARC Labs Pvt Ltd, a company that has been assisted by SIDBI for the mobile testing lab.

The food processing sector mainly comprises micro enterprises which are largely promoter-driven and have limited access to specialised BDS. ?This tends to affect their competitiveness and also limits growth opportunities. So this sector needs handholding and support over an extended period by way of affordable BDS and also access to credit,? KG Alai, head of the project management division at SIDBI said. The project is being funded by DFID and is in operation between August 2007 and August 2011.