The reviews are in. Three British Columbia agri-food companies are back home in our province getting ready to ship their products to new international customers after successful tradeshows in the United States, the Netherlands and South Korea.

The companies received matching funding through the BC Agrifood & Seafood Export Program, part of Growing Forward 2. The program supports industry participation in export market development activities, including at international tradeshows, promotional events, incoming and outgoing trade missions and to develop marketing materials for international audiences.

Some of the success stories featuring British Columbia agri-food companies include:

Sea to Sky Seasonings (Amola Salts) received funding up to $4,250 to attend San Francisco’s Winter Fancy Food Show in February. With the leads and orders they received from attending this largest speciality food event on the west coast, Amola anticipates they might double their gross sales in 2016. Based on Granville Island in Vancouver, Amola creates salts, seasonings and speciality herbs and spice mixes using as many locally grown and organic ingredients as possible.

The Chai Company, a Delta-based business, received funding up to $4,675 to showcase its organic chai concentrates at the Amsterdam Coffee Festival 2015. The Chai Company has been in operation for 13 years and already exports to the United States, South Korea and Hong Kong. Thanks to connections made at the festival the company will add Europe to its list of markets soon as it has received purchase orders for premium chai.

Kalala Organic Estate Winery received funding up to $5,075 to take part at the 2015 Seoul Food & Hotel Show. Kalala received lots of interest from potential buyers, and aims to export to the Korean market soon. These are exciting times for the West Kelowna business. In addition to enjoying export success in China and India, Kalala Organic Estate Winery recently took top spot at the prestigious Chardonnay du Monde competition in France for their Kalala 2013 Chardonnay Icewine.

Growing Forward 2 is a five-year agreement that provides a $3-billion, federal-provincial-territorial government investment in innovation, competitiveness and market development. Since 2013, Growing Forward 2 has invested more than $2 million in matched funding for 226 projects through the BC Agrifood & Seafood Export Program.

The BC Agrifood & Seafood Export Program is administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of B.C. Program information and applications are available at: http://iafbc.ca/funding-opportunities/export/

Quotes:

Lawrence MacAulay, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food –

“This programming helps B.C. companies showcase the diversity and quality of Canadian food products to buyers around the world and will go a long way in boosting international sales.”

Norm Letnick, B.C. Agriculture Minister –

“The B.C. government has been expanding the market for B.C. agri-foods around the world, reaching a record $3 billion in exports to more than 150 countries. Building markets is one of the key priorities in the B.C. Agrifood and Seafood Strategic Growth Plan as we look to increase provincial revenues in the agri-food and seafood sector to $15 billion a year by 2020.”

Sea to Sky Seasonings president Eric Pateman –

“It was an incredible opportunity to present our products at the largest speciality food trade event on the west coast at the Winter Fancy Food Show. The funding has assisted us in identifying new customers and we look forward to sharing our locally grown products with them soon.”

The Chai Company marketing and sales manager Catherine Wong –

“The funding we have received through the BC Agrifood & Seafood Export Program has allowed us to develop new international markets and attend more events to showcase our products.”

Kalala Organic Estate Winery proprietor Karnail Singh Sidhu –

“The BC Agrifood & Seafood Export Program gives new and smaller businesses that don't have the capital an opportunity to enter international markets. This program has been great for Kalala Organic Estate Winery as it has allowed us to introduce our product to the international buyers sooner than what we could have achieved on our own.”

Learn More:

2014 Export Highlights – B.C. Agri-food & Seafood: http://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/farming-natural-resources-and-industry/agriculture-and-seafood/statistics/exports/2014_bc_agrifood_and_seafood_export_highlights.pdf

For more information on Growing Forward 2 programs in British Columbia, visit: http://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/topic.page?id=EB8322DE53664C7289317829FA25360E

For more information on Growing Forward 2, visit: http://www.agr.gc.ca/eng/about-us/key-departmental-initiatives/growing-forward-2/?id=1294780620963