Cooperation between USJ and US-LIVCD to support honey, olive oil sectors

The Saint Joseph University Higher Institute of Agricultural Engineering in the Mediterranean countries (ESIAM) signed yesterday a cooperation agreement with USAID-funded Lebanon Industry Value Chain Development (LIVCD) with the aim to support the local honey and olive oil industries. According to the arrangement, and in collaboration with the USJ, USAID will finance the procurement of modern state-of-the-art machinery, known as the "Spectrophotomètre proche infrarouge-Transformées de Fourier or FT-NIR”. The latter can detect in less than a minute potential fraud in honey and olive oil samples, and can, besides that, measure different indices related to the quality of the product. Over and above, the machine is eco-friendly and does not require the use of any chemicals. (Al Mustaqbal, July 18, 2016)