Business brewing for Shavuot Farms

• November 04 2018
• http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/sunday-finance/business-brewing-for-shavuot-farms_148658

What started out as an idea to convert produce from the family's farm into value-added products, five years later, has grown into a business that now employs up to 50 staff and is continuously looking to ramp-up its product line.

Now a fully integrated agricultural and agro-processing enterprise under the name Shavuot International Holdings Ltd, the parent company for Shavuot Farms, the family-run company is not only looking to tea business bubbling, but also wants to carve out a niche in the breadfruit flour, oils and powdered spices market.

“We do a line of herbal teas, moringa, soursop powders, etc; but we have also moved into producing Scotch bonnet pepper powder, thyme and scallion powders and we are also doing breadfruit flour,” father and CEO of Shavuot Farms, Richard Harris told the Jamaica Observer.

Shavuot Farms produces a range of exotic teas using the leaves and seeds of the moringa plant, turmeric, cerassee, cinnamon, ginger, and combinations of those products, as well as the Jamaican black castor oil.

Operating from an 8,000 square feet space in Wynter's Pen, Spanish Town; Shavuot Farms, while not yet a household brand, caught the attention of the Jamaica Manufacturing and Exporters Association, the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) and IMF representative to Jamaica, Constant Lonkeng; who gathered for a tour of the company's manufacturing facility last week.

The business is spearheaded by Harris, given his experience in operations management, but is also managed by his two sons, Joel, who holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Management Studies, and Jordan Harris.

“We started the farms in 2013 and grew anything you could think about, Scotch bonnet peppers, cucumber, sorrel and immersed ourselves in the agricultural sector. We were able to make the kind of linkages that we needed with the Rural Agricultural Development Authority and MOA, then we moved into the second part of the process which is manufacturing,” Harris said.