International Pepper Community | » PROGRAMS AND ACTIVITIES OF IPC

Annual Session: IPC holds regular sessions, at least once every financial year. Each member country is represented by a delegate with plenipotentiary power. If necessary, one or more alternate delegates may also be appointed. The Community also regularly holds three different meetings to evolve its policies and programmes. These meetings address themselves to issues relating to techno-economic studies, farming, production and export promotion. The meetings are:
1. The Peppertech Meeting: is IPC’s permanent panel on techno-economic studies on pepper. This technical forum meets at least once a year and sets the guidelines for the Community’s operational agenda. The purpose of the meeting is to study, identify and evolve solutions for problems faced by the pepper industry in the areas of production, processing, marketing and product development.
2. The Meeting of Pepper Exporters is held regularly before the session to discuss the pepper economy, current production situation, domestic consumption, exports, imports, prices, prospects, problems and other matters related to pepper.
3. Pepperexim Meeting,is a meeting among producers and exporters with importers, traders and grinders of pepper. The meeting addresses various aspects of pepper such as the supply and demand situation in each producing and importing country, quality improvements and quality control, possible use of technology in improving pepper quality and information exchange.
IPC Committee on Quality Standardization: The International Pepper Community had constituted a Committee on Quality Standardization during the Special Meeting held at Jakarta in 1998. The committee comprises of experts from the industry as well as official representatives from the member countries. Through this Committee, IPC has established IPC Grades and Standards, including a Manual of Methods of Analyses and A Guideline on Good Manufacturing Practices for Pepper Establishments. A program of activities has been planned to make the use of these standards more effective. These include :
1. A proposal to train laboratory and other personnel involved in quality testing. The proposal seeks FAO funding for the training to be held in member countries.
2. An inter-lab proficiency testing programme for all labs involved in analysis of pepper quality from member countries; at present labs from Malaysia, India and Indonesia are participating in this programme.
3. Promotion of the IPC Standards among producing and consuming countries;
4. Representation to national and international agencies involved in setting standards so that the views of producing countries are given due significance.
IPC Committee on Marketing: IPC has formed a Committee on marketing to evolve joint programmes for generic promotion of pepper among the member countries, with the IPC as the nodal agency for coordination and implementation of the programmes mooted. The Committee operates in these functional areas:
1. Identifying potential markets and market segments.
2. Publication of generic promotional material, including new uses of pepper, recipes using pepper and nutritional information on pepper;
3. Participation in trade fairs and industry specific exhibitions, targeting countries where there are prospects for increasing consumption of pepper. IPC participation provides an umbrella for smaller firms from member countries to participate in such events.
Publications: IPC regularly compiles and disseminates information pertaining to pepper and the world pepper economy by various means, including:
1. Weekly Prices Bulletin which is published every Friday and furnishes information on current price trends at origins, prevailing spot prices as well as futures prices pepper at the main trading centres namely New York and Europe. Some data on trade and other up-to-date information related to the development of pepper is also included.
2. Pepper News & Market Review which provides with news of interest, related to the pepper community and also a review on the pepper market situation and trends during the previous month. This publication is circulated free of charge to the subscribers of Weekly Prices Bulletin
3. Focus on Pepper:is a half-yearly publication (formerly published as International Pepper News Bulletin), presenting technical articles on the production, processing and product development of pepper industry. Notes on research, news and selected trade statistics are also included in this publication.
4. Directory of Exporters and Importers:lists out exporters and importers complete with their particulars such as address, telephone, fax, email, contact persons and products etc. The Director is indexed by products, company, activity and country name. Other useful information is also included in the directory.
Cooperation on Research and Development Activities: IPC encourages cooperation in research and development activities among member countries through seminars and workshops presenting and sharing research findings (e.g., a symposium on Pests and Diseases of Pepper held in September 2002 in Kuching, Sarawak), publication of research findings, exchange of genetic material, building a reference database of scientists who are working on, or have worked on pepper and the annual Peppertech Meeting.