Desmet is pleased to be honoured with a new contract with Sao Mai Group. for their second fish oil refinery in Vietnam.
The picture shows the contract signing ceremony on 31 July 2016 in Vietnam.
This is the second phase of the fish oil refining project after having successfully commissioned the first fish oil refining plant in 2013. Sao Mai Group (ASM) is known as a well-established multibusiness brand engaging in a variety of business fields like real estate, tourism services, fishmeal and fisheries. And, the most remarkable development milestone in this sector is that the group has generated a new value for pangasius by refining premium oil from the common catfish in southern Vietnam.
The Mekong Delta annually provides no less that 140,000 tonnes of fish fat, but it is primarily used to make animal feed and biodiesel, or exported at a low price. Meanwhile, Vietnam is spending billions of US dollars every year to import vegetable oil, with demand rising. Earlier, some companies successfully processed fish fat into cooking oil, but they could not remove the fishy smell in the final product. As a result, the products failed. Around the world, fish fat is mainly used to produce fish oil capsules that supplement micronutrients for humans, not as fish oil for daily use as a food.
Seeing this, Sao Mai Group, led by President Le Thanh Thuan, sent many delegations to numerous other countries to study their technologies. Luckily, a European company agreed to conduct technological research and supply fish oil refining lines to the company.
“From the laboratory to commercial production is a long process of learning and changing. Therefore, it took several years to successfully produce fish oil for the market.” Mr Thuan said.
After over two years of study, in 2010, Sao Mai Group officially signed a US$15 million first contract with Belgium-based Desmet Group to import fish oil refining technology and equipment for the modern processing plant of 100 TPD. This line was invested to process and produce fish oil for human consumption. The fish oil factory was located on a nearly 4 ha campus in Binh Thanh commune, Lap Vo district, Dong Thap province.
The refining facility was turning out two products, stearin (thick oil) and olein (thin oil). Stearin was used for food processing industries (instant noodle, cream, butter, chocolate, cake, etc.) while olein was be distributed to the market in the form of cooking oil and nutrition oil for children (supplementing vitamins and unsaturated fatty acids needed for health).
Specifically, Sao Mai Group will also provide raw materials for pharmaceutical companies to produce fish oil capsules containing Omega 3, Omega 6 and Omega 9. Ranee premium fish oil will be an extremely important link in forming a closed processing chain for pangasius and shark catfish farming. By using fish fat, Ranee is a solution to raise the value of Vietnamese pangasius and Sao Mai Group is honoured to be the pioneer.