Integrated health supplement company, Bioalpha Holdings Berhad, has firmed up plans to bolster its presence in China. Through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Bioalpha (Hainan) Development Ltd, it has entered into a Collaboration Agreement with Gaolin Village Council to jointly develop Gaolin Village in Hainan province, China, to be named Malaysian Agricultural Hub.
The Village is strategically located with easy accessibility to Hainan’s capital city of Haikou and central city of Ding’an Country via various expressways, including the main trafficway. It has been approved for commercial and agricultural activities under the Communist Party of China Hainan Provincial Committee’s The Village Planning Programme 2020 – 2035.
Meanwhile, the development of the Hub, which shall be spearheaded by Bioalpha, will entail the construction of factory complex consisting of 30 units of factories. The Hub will have an initial paid-up capital of RMB10 million (~RM6.6 million) and authorized capital of RMB50 million (~RM33 million). The initial phase of the Hub focuses on the upstream and downstream activities such as formulation, manufacturing and even commercialization of functional food products using Malaysian indigenous and tropical herbs, such as Misai Kucing and Kacip Fatimah, targeted for local Chinese market. In addition, the Hub enables other Malaysian agricultural players such as manufacturers of durian and cocoa products to venture into China by investing and stationing at the Hub.
“We are excited to be entrusted by the Gaolin Council, which is a regional representative of the Chinese Government, to embark on this venture to elevate and develop the rural village of Gaolin. The Malaysian Agricultural Hub is a unique model that focuses on the complete integration supply chain for Malaysian agricultural products,” Managing Director of Bioalpha, Mr. William Hon commented.
“With the Hub, we can conduct research and development activities, formulate and manufacture our herbal-based products as well as eventually commercialize said products under one roof for the Chinese market. The abovementioned endeavor would provide the local Chinese population immediate access to our products as well as allows the Group to better gauge the domestic demand in order to roll out related products in the shortest time possible. For future phases, we may even plant our indigenous herbs as this could reduce logistics costs of importing raw materials from overseas.”
“With the R&D and manufacturing facility setup within the Hub, we can expand our existing capacity to cater to rising orders in respect of our health food supply contract. Moreover, we can also source the region’s agricultural produce to enhance the Group’s range of offerings moving forward. This ultimately strengthens our foothold in China and allows us to meet our sales target.”
To recap, Bioalpha has a supply contract to deliver health food ingredients to customers in Guizhou, China. These ingredients shall be utilized to prepare health food and nutritional meals for the private and public sectors there. In order to maintain the quality and safety of the products manufactured at the Hub, the Group shall adopt the best practices in the operations as it strives to attain local and internal accreditations including Good Manufacturing Practice and Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point.
On the other hand, the R&D centre enables Bioalpha to formulate and test products using herbs from the Southeast Asian region, as well as China. This ensures the regular rollouts of offerings are well-suited for the Chinese masses.
“As the anchor company of the Hub, we will also serve as the link to companies in Malaysia that wish to market their products in China and assist in providing services such as R&D, manufacturing and commercialization. This opens up the lucrative Chinese market for Malaysian companies seeking to expand to China.”
“In conclusion, we are delighted to officially pen the Agreement today. We look forward to a productive relationship between the two parties, with the union boosting our chances of tapping into even more market opportunities China has to offer in the near future,” Mr. Hon concluded.
