Dairy majors to get sops for natural vanilla

The commerce ministry is preparing a scheme for this and a notification will be issued shortly. The ministry has planned to provide the difference in prices between natural and synthetic vanilla as subsidy.

According to Vanilla India Producers Company (Vanilco) managing director Paul Jose, Minister of State for Commerce and Industries Jairam Ramesh has agreed to provide the subsidy to boost the consumption of natural vanilla in the domestic dairy-based products market.

Talking to Business Standard, he said cooperative institutions will get a "substantial rate" as subsidy. Natural vanilla essence is quoting at 1,500 a kg while, the synthetic vanilla is ruling around Rs 500 a kg.

A mixture of the natural vanilla and the synthetic variety, making up half the quantity of the natural variety, can give good results and work out cheaper. So the average price can be calculated at the rate of Rs 750 a kg for natural vanilla.

The actual rate of subsidy will be finalised later, after a detailed discussion with Amul, the largest milk marketing federation in the country that consumes a chunk of vanilla, said Jose.

Amul and the Kerala State Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (Milma) currently use natural vanilla for making ice creams and other products. Both Amul and Milma have completely switched over to natural vanilla since the last three months, with Amul consuming about 8 tonnes.

The cooperative major had signed an agreement with Vanilco to procure natural vanilla for three years. Vanilla Royale, a natural vanilla-based ice cream of Amul has been a big hit in the domestic market and is sales have increased by 50 per cent in the last quarter.