This month marks a significant milestone for American Lorain. The China-based convenience food processor announced today that it has finished installing its first chestnut decladding machine. The company predicts that the machine’s average processing capacity could reach 3 metric tons per hour.

The machinery, imported from Europe, preheats chestnuts into dry condition and declads them using ejected natural gas flames. A connected pipeline carries the unshelled chestnuts directly to frozen storage, where they will wait to be used. American Lorain plans to use the unshelled chestnuts for several of its products, including syrup and chestnut snack packs.

Mr. Si Chen, company Chairman and CEO, remarked, “Before introducing the automated decladding line, our chestnuts were mostly unshelled by hand. As labor costs continue to rise in China, we introduced this automated line in an effort to reduce our reliance on human labor. Enhancing automation, increasing productivity and reducing cost constitute our main focus in the next few years and we are glad American Lorain has made a solid step in this direction.”

For more information on American Lorain, its chestnut products, or its other convenience and frozen products, visit www.americanlorain.com

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