The De Marchi Group produces a wide variety of frozen foods and “in Nature” foods for Brazil and other countries in addition to cultivating fruit, vegetables, and greens on a huge scale. The company aims to surpass customers’ expectations in a competitive market by providing superior, healthier, and most importantly, more sustainable products.
Agribusiness accounts for over 23 percent of Brazil’s gross domestic product. Brazil’s fruit and vegetable market has been growing steadily and is now a very important part of the economy. Although fruit and vegetables are not yet ingrained in the Brazilian population’s diet, their popularity is increasing, boosted by natural and organic foods that consumers favor for their health benefits.
TOMRA: a partnership with many benefits
Carlos Alberto De Marchi, Industrial Director at De Marchi, emphasizes the importance of his business partnership with TOMRA. “It gives us several advantages,” he says, “the main one being the increased quality of our product.”
Carlos explains that before the TOMRA 5B’s installation, the process was “completely manual”, but now the TOMRA machine has brought great progress, “not only in terms of resource management but also in terms of economics. Not only was the increase in profitability measurable, but also important was the food safety that the machine added to the product. In addition, we know that labor work is becoming more complex every day. People can’t do repetitive work with a high degree of concentration for very long, so the machine greatly increases reliability in the selection process.”
Six months after installing the TOMRA machine and working with various types of fruit and vegetables, the feedback couldn’t be more positive. Carlos comments: “With the automation of the line, we have a 30 percent increase in productivity and much greater safety in the products we produce, which would have been impossible with the manual process. Moreover, we’re bringing together profitability, reliability, and agility in our processes to reach higher levels. We have exceptional personalized support from TOMRA through various channels, which makes all the difference.”
João Medeiros, Area Sales Manager of TOMRA Food Brazil, says: “This partnership is key in a sector as important as fruit and vegetables. De Marchi is an innovative company with a strong presence on the national and international market, and it’s undoubtedly a very important partnership for TOMRA in the minimally processed fruit and vegetable segment. It’s an honor to supply a high-tech optical food sorting solution to one of Brazil’s largest companies in the sector.”
As always, TOMRA and the customer worked closely together. João Medeiros explains: “TOMRA designed the solution together with De Marchi, taking great care over the details because the customer’s range of products is large and requires a complete solution that can add value to all the products in the range. The demonstration of the machine at TOMRA’s modern test center in Santiago, Chile, was also of great importance in defining the project.“
TOMRA 5B: versatile and focused on productivity
The main benefits of using the TOMRA 5B optical sorter are maximum food safety, higher quality product sorting, optimized production line throughput, and ease of operation. Product quality becomes more consistent, and employees who previously worked on sorting can be redirected to other important parts of the production line.
João Medeiros says: “With the growing search for innovative food sorting technologies and the need to meet increased consumer demand and expectations, the TOMRA 5B machine has been breaking barriers in the Brazilian market. It is proving to be very efficient in various applications, especially in the minimally processed vegetable and fruit segments, as well as for frozen pre-fried potatoes.
“Optical technology automates the food selection process, increasing the quality and productivity of the production line. The machine maintains constant inspection quality, increasing the safety of the food that reaches the consumer’s table.”
João Medeiros looks forward to TOMRA’s continuing cooperation with De Marchi. “We are sure that this is just the beginning of a great and long-lasting partnership, because De Marchi is constantly looking for innovations, whether in the industrial area or in the field. Our mission is to serve them with the utmost excellence, contributing our experience to future projects to automate new lines, always supporting De Marchi’s success.”
This confidence is shared by Carlos Alberto De Marchi, who explains that “due to the excellent results achieved and the opening of new production lines, it is possible that we will be making new machine purchases in the near future.”
