New banana riper Thiry Gent has a capacity of 32,000 boxes per week

At the start of April Wholesale Thiry in the distribution centre in Evergem finished the construction of a new banana riper. The group PrimaMundo already has a riper in Coccinelle in Sint-Katelijne-Waver, but more space was needed urgently and the plans were made to build the new cells in Evergem in the middle of last year. Main riper Pieter Verachtert says that they ripen for the entire group and distribute the boxes from Evergem. "The volume we can ripen is now almost five times as big and the size of the ripening building is 32,000 m2. We have made sure that the building and the cell are environmentally friendly and waste as little energy as possible. We also believe that it is important that our bananas are supplier to customer perfectly, so we saved no expense in the area of quality. These are hyper modern and computer controlled ripening chambers and the bananas are gradually brought to colour under the watchful eye of our specialists as the ripening process is stimulated."

Precise process
According to Pieter ripening is a true profession. "It is a learning process that you pass from one person to another. We now have three permanent people here who are experienced in ripening. There are various factors that influence the way in which the banana is ripened. The origin of the fruit is very important, is the climate in the country very dry or damp? You have to handle the temperature, air and gas in ripening precisely and correctly, to get the optimal colour. You can't be taught this, it can only be done by experience and feeling." Ripening usually takes between 4 and 8 days, but it depends on what colour the customer wants and when they are due to be supplied."

Specialised
Abroad, the trend is for retailer to ripen themselves, but this is not the case in Belgium. "It is a big investment with risks in various areas, and supermarket chains don't do that here. We are specialised in this and they are happy to leave it to use. Ripening is a true profession." Pieter himself has around 15 years of experience in ripening. "You can see different things change. A lot less coolant is used than in the past, and the cells can be brought to temperature more quickly. Everything is now visualised on the computer now too. But the basics of ripening are the same as they used to be, we still use the same ripening scheme. It is a clean evolution to see the bananas arrive as green as grass and watch them change day by day. The bananas are checked every day so that we have a general overview of how the party is doing."

Space for growth
Thiry ripens around 32,000 boxes per week. "Most is intended for the Colruyt Group and we also ripening for various other parties. We took space for growth into account with this new building, so as far as that is concerned we are sorted for the time being."

For more information:
Thiry Gent
Brugse Steenweg 7/40
Magazijn 25
9940 Evergem
Tel.: +32 (0)9 222 57 11
Fax: +32 (0)9 221 14 20
info@thirygent.be
www.primamundo.com