Vietnam can make VCO with non-heating technology

With a centrifugal method, no high temperatures, and no chemicals used in the production process, the product quality meets strict standards of the Asia Pacific Coconut Community (APCC) and the Philippines.

Ben Tre Province is home to many enterprises which process products of different kinds from coconut, including coconut milk powder, coconut candy, coconut oil and activated carbon. 

However, the coconut production and processing is mainly carried out on a small scale, with old technology and outdated equipment. As a result, productivity and quality are low, while products cannot be preserved for a long time. 

Ben Tre Province wants a modern VCO production technology that makes standard products for export. That is why a project on extracting coconut oil with non-heating technology was implemented as part of the national program on technology renovation.

According to Nguyen Phuong from the Biology Center belonging to the Technology Application Institute, scientists, after analyzing physical properties and chemical composition of two coconut varieties grown on a large scale in Ben Tre and Phu Yen provinces, found that Vietnam’s coconuts are not inferior to other countries’ products.

The percentage of copra (dried meat of the coconut) is 29-30 percent, and the fat content is quite high 35.52 - 38.12 percent, while the free fatty acid content in copra is 0.12 - 0.13 percent (for the first 10 days of storage).

The analyses allowed scientists to create a copra extraction process without using heat. The VCO created by the process can be preserved for three years in brown glass packs, or 0.5 mm thick PET bottles at a temperature of 15-27oC. The VCO humidity is 0.037 percent.

A VCO production line with the capacity of 1,000 liters per hour has been designed and installed at the Luong Quoi Coconut Processing Company in Ben Tre.

With the production line’s capacity of 5 million VCO liters and the consumption of 75 million coconuts a year, the technology has helped increase the value of the company’s purified coconut oil by 25 percent, according to Luong Quoi’s deputy director.

Luong Quoi’s VCO can meet APCC quality, requirements of the US FDA to enter the US market and BRC Food to enter the EU market.

According to the Ben Tre Coconut Association, in 2016 Vietnam exported 193 tons of VCO (cold pressing technology). Now with the production capacity of 5,000 tons per annum, the export capacity can increase by 26 times.

According to the Asia Pacific Coconut Association (APCC), world demand for VCO is 3 million tons a year.