CFT Group has delivered its first turnkey line in Nicaragua, for FRUTCO DE LAS AMERICAS. This company is born from the merger between the Swiss based banana puree broker FRUTCO, and fresh banana producer COEN GROUP, based in Nicaragua but with Italian roots, employing over 7.000 persons worldwide.
The CFT Group/ FRUTCO project
CFT Group and FRUTCO companies first encounter took place during Juice Summit 2015, a well-known meeting point for the professionals of the Juice community, organized by the I.F.U (International Fruit & Vegetable Association.)
Let’s discover the highlights of CFT first complete banana line, designed and manufactured especially for FRUTCO to answer specific needs (passion fruit juice and banana puree for multiple purposes such as baby food production for instance):
CFT aseptic filler Macropak was offered with a special OXONIA KIT, used to fill low-acid products, such asbanana puree. The company is actually about to obtain the FDA (Food & Drug Administration) validation, necessary for the customer to be authorized to sell its puree in the USA and reach the highest product quality on the market.
FRUTCO also had a special request to handle its passion fruit puree with extreme care: thanks to CFT dedicated extractor GIUBILEO, FRUTCO is able to reach anextraction return of up to 30%, combined with a peel depulper which is going to recover up to 5% of juice. The second step is the product flowing into our GIUBILEO extractor which task is to carefully eliminate any possible seed, to finally arrive into our decanter where black specks are removed. The juice obtained in the end can be sterilized and aseptically filled, or alternatively, it can be cooled down to be finally freezed.
CFT Group has designed and engineered a special series of resized scraped surface heat exchangers, our OLIMPIC range, and, in the same time, has drastically improved its maintenance system.
The star rotating valve is usually mounted on the Cold Extractor GIUBILEO, to avoid the entry of air in the machine. In this specific case it has been decided to locate it on a hopper which works as a buffer, where the banana (peeled and still unbroken) remains for some minutes before beingin activated.
CFT Group complete lines for the Tropical fruit Industry: a 360° partnership
This new project highlights the strong presence of CFT Group in the Tropical fruit Industry, with highly innovative solutions able to handle even specific Fruits needing a suitable equipment, such as the banana and the passion fruit. CFT Group highly precise equipment allows to reach very high quality standards in terms of product preservation, whilst answering all hygiene standards.
Beyond the design and installation of the machine, the collaboration between CFT Group and FRUTCO/ COEN GROUP has been a real partnership. CFT Group provided a complete 360° consulting support, allowing to launch this activity in the best possible way, always with the aim to maximize the machines performance.
CFT is also present locally, thanks to a partnership with FISA group to provide premium and prompt technical support throughout the whole installation and in the after-sales phase as well.
AWARDS: Talking about I.F.U
For the record, CFT had already won the I.F.U Innovation Award in 2016 for our ZENITH technology: we have been rewarded for “our innovation and our outstanding contribution towards the fruit and vegetable juice industry”. The IFU is the largest fruit juice manufacturers organisation in the world, which has been in existence for 50 years and now represents 32 Countries. Designed specifically for fruit (and tomatoes) the «technology was patented in 2006 – states Mario Gozzi, sales area manager of CFT – in order to extract the fruit puree in an anaerobic (oxygen-free) atmosphere, and then proceed immediately with the heat treatment, thereby avoiding product oxidation, which is normally a very rapid process that turns fruit and vegetables brown. The result is a brighter, more natural product, which fully maintains its nutritional and organoleptic properties without the need for antioxidant additives».
The Zenith Chrono lines has already encountered a very quick prompt success, handling peaches, apricots and ultimately to tropical fruit – explains Gozzi – and that’s not all. In addition to puree, we have also started to apply this technology to cloudy juices».
Daniele Toni