Pack houses, sorting and grading lines, delivered turnkey with the civil works.

A pack house is where fruit is received, pre-cooled, washed, sorted, graded, packed and dispatched. It is the part of the cold chain that India is short of: NCCD's capacity assessment counted around 500 pack houses against a requirement near 70,000, while bulk cold storage is close to sufficient. A pack house with a CA store beside it lets a grower sell graded fruit through the year instead of ungraded fruit in the six weeks after harvest.

What we have built

For HPMC, a 5,600 MT pack house at Tutupani, Shimla, and a 1,000 MT pack house at Bhuntar, Kullu, each as design, supply and installation of the line including the civil works, on a turnkey basis. Also for HPMC, the upgradation of the fruit processing plant at Parwanoo, Solan, with design, supply, installation and testing of equipment and civil work.

Grading and packing halls inside CA stores: the 1,25,000 sq ft CA store with grading and packing for CONCOR at Rai; the 65,000 sq ft CA store and pack house for FIL Industries at Rangreth, Srinagar; and the 60,000 sq ft CA store with packing and grading building for Fruit Master Agro at Lassipora. Under construction: the supply, installation, testing and commissioning of a pack house with sorting and grading unit and CA storage infrastructure for the State Agriculture Marketing Board, Uttarakhand, at Arakot, Uttarkashi.

How we size the enquiry

Throughput in MT per season and per day at peak, the commodities and their grading criteria, whether pre-cooling and a CA or cold store sit alongside, and the dispatch pattern. The line is specified with the equipment supplier; the building is designed around the line, not the other way round. Note the unit: a pack house is quoted in throughput capacity, a store in storage capacity, both in MT.

How a CA store gets built covers the sequence for a combined pack house and store.