Bismillahirrahmanirrahim.

My dear International Pepper Community Family,

Assalamualaikumwarahmatullahiwabarakatuh and I hope you are doing well and are safe.

Today, 5 May 2023 marks 2 years of my tenure leading the International Pepper Community as the Executive Director. Personally, it has been a great experience and an exciting venture into one of the biggest industries in the spices commodity. These past two years, I have been blessed to get acquainted with a lot of wonderful experts of the industry which have imparted their expertise as well as valuable experiences. Their display of kindness, professionalism and perseverance have not only been beneficial for me personally but also for the entire of the IPC Family.

Although during my tenure as the Executive Director of the International Pepper Community various programmes and projects have been concluded, there are still lots of goals that need to be achieved in the future. Moving forward, IPC continues to maintain close partnership with key players of the pepper industry. Following the aftermath of the global pandemic, IPC has managed to organize series of IPC Webinar in collaboration with renown partners of the Pepper Industry like ASTA, IDH-The Sustainable Trade Initiative and many other. In addition, IPC has also managed to organize series of International Pepper Day Celebration with the purpose of promoting the use of pepper and increasing the consumption of pepper. Furthermore, in commemorating the 50^th Years of the establishment of the International Pepper Community, IPC has commissioned the production and publication of IPC 50^th Journey video and book.

IPC Committees have continued progressively their work on Research and Development, Quality and Marketing to ensure the fulfilment of IPC’s objectives of co-ordinating, harmonizing and promoting the activities of the pepper industry with a view to achieve accelerated economic development. IPC has continued the work on monitoring the pepper consignment rejection by the consuming countries as well as keep updating the trade and quality regulation or requirement of the consuming countries so as to help pepper exporters and farmers. Furthermore, IPC has also managed to complete and publish the revision of IPC Manual of Method of Analysis, Manual on Quality Requirement of Pepper for Export as well as few series of Focus on Pepper.    

Finally, IPC has completed the IPC Farmers App Programme with the launch of IPC Farmers App Malaysia in October 2022. This project which was first started in 2018 has been successfully implemented in all of IPC member countries with over 10,000 users across the world. IPC is currently in the process of approaching few pepper producing countries in the hope of enlarging the membership of the Community to better develop the industry.

IPC will continue to formulate more programme and projects for the betterment of all of the pepper industry stakeholders. We will cater all our programmes and projects specifically to address issues of the stakeholders of the pepper industry both on the supply and demand side.

Thus, being said, I would like to invite all IPC member countries and stakeholders of the pepper industry to come together to strengthen our network and address global challenges in solidarity. Let’s join hands to work together in making sure the sustainability of the pepper industry and the prosperity of all stakeholders. And thank you for all the support, guidance, trust, and encouragement to the IPC Secretariat for the past years for us to ensure the industry is well taken care of. #togetherwearestronger

Sincerely and Salam Hormat,

Firna Azura Ekaputri Hj. Marzuki