Potato processor Snow Valley Food benefits from an efficient collaboration with TOMRA Food

Snow Valley Food is the owner of a leading frozen french fries processing industry group of companies in Asia. The parent company, Snow Valley Agricultural Development co., ltd., is a large organization that operates across the whole industrial chain in the potato industry, integrating R&D, planting, production, processing, storage, transportation, and marketing.

By prioritizing highly efficient Potato processing, Snow Valley has been awarded excellent accreditations and ongoing public praise over the years – complimented by specialized research, delivering consistently high-quality products, and providing better solutions for the Chinese catering industry.

Ever since its establishment, Snow Valley has benchmarked production against the highest global processing standards. Partnering with global Potato processing experts and installing fully automated TOMRA production lines plays a core role in their peeling and sorting process and meeting their own high standards.

A potato processing giant with the advantage of extensive seed potato expertise

The founder of snow Valleys Noicultural development co., ltd. ("Snow Valley Group"), of which Snow Valley is a subsidiary, and has 30+ years of extensive experience in the potato industry - successfully introducing nearly a hundred varieties of potatoes and cultivating new strains.

Snow Valley Group’s raw materials supply and quality bring competitive advantages to their intensive Potato processing. The Group is a leader in terms of both, Potato agronomy and cultivation techniques, enabling them to produce an exceptionally large volume of high-quality Potatoes from a planting area of 1 million mu, which brings annual yields of 100,000 tons passing ISO, Global G.A.P., and "Green Food" certification.

With an investment of RMB 1 billion(about USD 150 million) in its Potato processing production, Snow Valley now operates three production lines, including two lines dedicated to producing high-quality frozen French Fries. These processing lines consume an estimated 400,000 tons of raw Potatoes and the annual production capacity has reached 150,000 tons of frozen French Fries and 10,000 tons of Potato Flakes.
 

Industry leadership has furthered Snow Valley’s advancement of its Potato production lines - creating a series of consumer products, including Coating French Fries, eat-in French Fries, Straight Cut French Fries, Thick French Fries, Potato Specialties, and Potato Flakes, to meet the demands from various customers.

With every province having its own marketing outlets, except Tibet, Snow Valley now runs a sales network covering 14 different nations and more than 50 regions. High-quality production using international advanced and smart technologies.

Currently, frozen French Fries hold the highest production volume for Snow Valley, which is where they have cooperated with TOMRA the most. Quality-conforming frozen French Fries must meet the sensory requirements of shape, taste, color, smell, and hygiene indicators.

World-class enterprise with leading-edge technologies

To ensure the delivery of high-quality and delicious products to customers, Snow Valley has installed TOMRA’s Eco Steam Peeling line, the TOMRA 5A Whole Potato sorter, and the TOMRA 5B sorter for wet French Fries and frozen French Fries.

These additions operate at high efficiency, reduce waste, reduce the environmental impact, and offer smart connections to factory automation. The TOMRA POM/DYN length analyzer is equipped in the laboratories responsible for quality control, ensuring food safety and quality control.
 Wang Nan, CEO of Snow Valley Group:
 

"We aimed to become a world-class enterprise from the first day we started. TOMRA has always been one of the world’s leading companies when it comes to peeling and sorting, which aligns with the expectations and ambition of Snow Valley. This past decade of Snow Valley Food also witnesses our 10-year partnership with TOMRA. It’s fair to say that TOMRA has been there every step of the way with Snow Valley Food’s growth."

In May 2020, Snow Valley Food was selected as one of the Green Plants in Hebei Province as it has pursued a strict implementation of modern and safe production with imported international state-of-the-art equipment.

The combination of efficient collaboration to secure a quality-honored brand

TOMRA Steam Peelers have been installed in all three production lines of Snow Valley. With TOMRA’s excellent Eco Steam Peelers, peel loss has been reduced, reliability has increased, and the valuable raw material is saved from waste, thereby directly improving yields.

Another feature of the Eco Steam Peeler is that the entire process is operated through smart control. This, combined with its unique XP & XPT valve technology, achieves peeling a large number of Potatoes within seconds and using less steam.

Snow Valley Food installed the TOMRA 5A Whole Potato sorter immediately after the Steam Peeling stage, to accurately remove Potato defects such as green Potatoes, rotten Potatoes, black spots, scabs, etc. This reduces the risk of contamination in the production process at later stages and effectively protects core equipment such as water conservancy cutters.

Zheng Fushu, Chief Technical Engineer of Snow Valley Food:
 

"With the addition of Peeling Process Control, pixel-level inspection, and Automatic Control Modules, the TOMRA 5A evaluates the peeling status of Potatoes while simultaneously sorting Whole Potatoes. It uses this information to provide feedback to the front-end Eco Steam Peeler, thus achieving automatic and smart optimization of peeling effects."

Most of Snow Valley’s clients are high-quality Potato suppliers to large chain catering brands, retail, and 5-star hotels and restaurants in China with strict standards for quality. The TOMRA 5B identifies the smallest defects via the high-resolution panoramic camera 360° view offering high accuracy and minimizing product waste.

The TOMRA 5B has undoubtedly become the guard to the fortress in Snow Valley Foods’ battle for product safety and quality control.

TOMRA technology and service are present across the entire process

As the driver for sales and reputation, the quality satisfaction offered by Snow Valley products has facilitated Snow Valley Group in its revenue breakthrough of over 1 billion RMB (about USD 150 million) in 2020.

Huge shipments call for robust production and a stable supply and see Snow Valley Foods operate on a 14×24-hour basis, making reliable operation of equipment, and the timeliness of professional support particularly important.
 Zheng Fushu:
 

"TOMRA is the only international company so far that can provide local service on time and quickly respond to our needs within 24 hours, even during holidays. Another thing about TOMRA is that its equipment has low downtime, and there is required storage of spare parts in China, which are especially important for us."

Strive for national brand revitalization and take lead in industrial advancement

It has long been one of Snow Valley Group’s corporate missions to "strive for national brand revitalization and make China a nation with internationally renowned potato industry by enhancing market popularity with quality potato products".In 2021, SNOW VALLEY GROUP successively won two honors, including "2021 China’s Top 500 Brands" and "2021 China’s 500 Most Valuable Brands”, ranking them among the well-recognized Chinese brands with high credibility and strong authority.

Honors won by the Group offer motivation to Snow Valley Food to further build their brand, grasp the pulse of the catering market, and strengthen its unique competitive edge across the entire industry.

Wang Nan:
 

"The support from TOMRA doesn’t come only with equipment, but also innovative customized solutions. In the next 10 years, we hope SNOW VALLEY as a Group can reach another revenue breakthrough from RMB 1 billion (about USD 150 million) to RMB 10 billion (about USD 1,5 billion). And we also look forward to our joint growth with TOMRA in the future."