By HELEN ZULU –

A LOCAL firm will set up a cassava processing company in the newly-created Kalumbila District in North-Western Province at a cost of 3.5 million euros.
Premiercon Starch Company Limited has partnered with Dutch Agricultural Development and Trading Company BV (DADTCO) to establish the firm.
Premiercon Starch Company Limited is a Solwezi-based startup company specialising in promotion of high yielding and short maturing varieties of cassava amongst smallholder farmers and subsequently provide market for the raw tubers.
DADTCO is a Netherland’s private sector company, established in 2002, which bases its approach on the combination of private entrepreneurship with a social vision.
Premiercon Starch Company Limited chief executive officer Lubasi Yuyi said the two companies had agreed to set up starch processing company in Kalumbila which would be jointly owned.
Mr Yuyi said the partnership would form the bridge between the smallholder cassava farmers and Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) industries with breakthrough world-class technologies such as DADTCO patented Automobile Processing Units (AMPU) and enzymatic processes.
He said this in an interview yesterday.
“We have partnered with DADTCO to set up a joint venture Starch Processing Company to be situated in Kalumbila District with a total investment of 3.5 million euros. This will be a mobile processing circuit, meaning the plant will be movable,” Mr Yuyi said.
He said the processing company had projected to be producing 7,200 tonnes of starch annually when production starts and equivalent of production of raw tubers from 8,000 small-holder farmers each doing a lima or two.