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Serendib Flour Mills, an innovator and trend setter, with your health at heart recently provided ten employees with the opportunity to participate in the ‘Serendib Flour Mills Technical Exchange Programme’ in Canada. The seven day programme was held in partnership with Cigi (Canadian International Grains Institute). The Serendib team comprised members from the milling, quality assurance, sales and marketing teams as well as members from the supply chain and finance departments.

The programme was designed to provide an all-round training in the technical use of western Canadian wheat and to demonstrate the different wheat classes and grades. Participants were educated on how to optimize western Canadian wheat to meet customer needs and how to blend it with wheat from other origins. Participants were provided with the opportunity to engage with the Cigi staff in milling, baking and pasta technology, pulse processing and analytical services.

Commenting on the training programme Kalinga Wijesekera - Senior Manager, Sales and Marketing Serendib Flour Mills stated “Serendib Flour Mills has been in the industry for seven years and throughout we have made it our mission to educate our employees and partners on how to provide our customers with the best product. The process of milling is under-estimated by those who do not have the knowhow of the industry. Milling is not a simple task, it is a very long and technical process. Thus our employees require an immense amount of training. The Cigi programme is the ultimate training experience for our employees and will provide them with the expertise that will help them. This will help us develop our product further and provide our consumers with the highest quality product.”

Cigi is a not-for-profit, independent institute which works with the grain and field crop value chain through Canada and internationally. Cigi is funded by farmers, the Government of Canada and industry partners. Cigi drives the development and utilization of Canadian agricultural products. The organization aims to increase utilization opportunities for Canadian grain and field crops trough superior knowledge, technical expertise, industry leadership and collaboration, innovative processing solutions, and targeted training. Cigi’s facilities include a pilot flour mill, pilot and test bakeries, pilot noodle plant, pilot pasta and extrusion plant, pulse processing and speciality milling facility and analytical and food testing laboratories.

Serendib Flour Mills is of the leading flour mills in Sri Lanka and is a joint venture between Al Ghurair Foods (AGF) and Emirates Trading Agency (ETA). The company’s ‘Seven Star’ brand of flour has been nourishing the nation for seven years and embodies purity, innovation, quality, freshness, expertise, service and trust. Serendib Flour Mills is committed to becoming the number one producer of wheat flour in Sri Lanka and the preferred flour supplier in international markets. Serendib Flour Mills launched operations with a state-of-the-art single-line capacity wheat flour mill in the Port of Colombo on 26 May 2008. Serendib Flour Mills has developed and implemented an integrated management system (IMS) based on ISO 9001:2008, ISO 14001:2004, BS OHSAS 18001:2007 and ISO 22000:2005 requirements. The system complies with applicable laws and regulations, international standards and codes, and best manufacturing practices in the areas of quality, environment, occupational health and safety and food safety.