Sona Agro launches duo chocolate wafers
Sona Agro Allied Foods Limited has launched a locally sourced chocolate coated cream wafer ‘Duo Chocolate Wafers’ into the Nigerian market. The product is the first of its kind in the land.
Similarly, as part of the company’s aggressive drive to grow its made- in-Nigerian biscuits portfolio; it plans to increase its production capacity to 10 times more than its current 2,500 tonnes per month. This according to the Group Managing Director, Sona Group of Industries, Ajai Musaddi, the firm seeks to achieve through investment in machineries, production of innovative products and local sourcing of materials.
Musaddi made the disclosure at the official launch of the wafer brand and factory tour attended by bank representatives, financial partners and other stakeholders.
He said sourcing of materials locally offered the company the opportunity to produce innovative and customer centric products that could compete favourably with foreign substitutes.
Musaddi said, “The fact is that all our products in Sona Agro are locally sourced. Our policy is that we should be based on local ingredients, flour, chocolates and others. I will say 90 per cent of the ingredients are locally produced in Nigeria. We believe in local ingredients. We also believe that something that is local can be more cost effective and price competitive and we can offer the consumers a good price.”
In the same vein, the Managing Director, Sona Agro Allied Foods Limited, Subramanian Murugesan, said with the company’s heavy investment in machineries, it was able to produce quality biscuits that could be compete favourably with any biscuits brands internationally.
Murugesan said, “With this highly automated plants and machineries of European make, with this high level of hygiene, Sona Agro plant is able to produce products with consistent quality which will be competing with any products from Europe and America.”
He also informed that they made their first export of biscuits products during June for Ghana and this was bound to grow more exports.
According to industry watchers, biscuits manufacturing has soared from an annual growth rate of 1-2 per cent to 20 “due to the ban on Importation of biscuits”. The growth rate is also driven by Nigeria’s rising population growth and the demand for chocolate has been on the increase because of its health benefits.
The Sales and Marketing Manager of the company, Ogunyemi Olufemi, explained that, “The uniqueness of the product is that it comes with two flavours, the first of the kind in Nigeria. You are paying less for good quality. You have chocolate and vanilla coming together. We see the health benefit of chocolate. Chocolate is good for kidney function; it increases brain functioning.
That is why we are focusing on chocolate.”
Commenting on the new product launch, Relationship Manager, Sterling Bank, Olumuyiwa Oyatokun, one of the financial partners of Sona Agro Allied Foods, said the initiative would help boost the country’s agricultural sector through massive cocoa production to cater for growing chocolate demand locally.
“A lot of Nigerians like to eat Chocolate and if you look at the country where we produce so much cocoa, we have to export to produce chocolate. This kind of initiative and innovation is welcome in Nigeria and a lot of people will buy this product”
In addition, the Commercial Banking Officer, Skye Bank, Adekunle Adediran, applauded the company’s contribution to the growth of the biscuits industry and assured the firm of his bank’s continuous support, just as he commended the product quality and packaging which he said could compete with any international brand substitute because of its rich chocolate.
Sona Agro Allied Foods Limited which is a member of Sona Group of Industries produces Sona Digestive, Thin Crackers Biscuits, Sona Krispee, Sona Choppy’s, Sona Bites, Sona Ginger Delight, Golden Fairy Vanilla Wafer, Sona Choco Cream and the newly launched Duo Chocolate Wafers.
Olusola Bello