The Coca-Cola Mozambique company is looking for local raw materials for its new product, the mango-flavored Cappy Delight juice. The information was revealed to the press yesterday, as part of a guided tour that the company organized to share with the media about production processes in Mozambique.

According to the regional director of Public Relations and Development, Neide Pires, the company is not comfortable with continuing to import mangoes from neighboring countries, such as Kenya, which is a raw material that the country can supply, with all the benefits that this brings to the value chain and business opportunities for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs).

"We've already talked to some producers in Manica province and they explained that mangoes, for example, have a certain time of year. What we want is to ensure that we have a stock that can supply the company all year round. The pulp needs to be concentrated and preserved so that it can be used even when mangoes are scarce," said Neide Pires.

To this end, the multinational is challenging Mozambican companies to look at this opportunity to produce mangoes of the required quality and in sufficient quantity to produce the pulp needed to ensure production throughout the year.

However, without specifying the quantities of mango pulp needed per year, Coca-Cola stressed that this will depend on the availability or capacity of the market to supply the fruit, since there is currently no producer of this pulp and investment is needed.

The source, quoted by AIM, stressed the company's approach to operating with local content, revealing that more than 54 percent of the raw material in all production is local, namely sugar, boxes for containers and carbon dioxide.

During the same visit, Coca-Cola reaffirmed its vision to continue investing in the automation of production processes in Mozambique.

Over the last 10 years, the company has invested more than 200 million dollars in automating the plant and improving its products, building seven soft drink filling lines, of which it only operates two, to meet the demand of the domestic market.