Production of gluten-free foods containing oats, oat bran and oat flour will grow as awareness of gluten intolerance increases, says the chief executive officer of Avena Foods in Regina.
Maryellen Carlson said demand for pure oat products made in Canada and the United States, as well as oat ingredients produced at Avena’s pure oat processing facility in Regina, are growing at a rate of 15 to 30 percent per year.
Pure Oats, known as gluten-free oats in the United States, are specialty oats that are grown and harvested under an identity preserved production system to ensure purity.
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To qualify as pure oats, crops must contain less than 20 parts per million of gluten.
Avena, formerly known as Farm Pure Foods, procures all of its pure oats from shareholders located across the Prairies.
The company has about 50 shareholders, about 40 of whom are pedigreed seed growers.
“We have a very rigorous protocol with our seed growers, requiring field inspections and very strict protocols on the way they handle the product, the equipment they use and the testing they are required to do before (the crop) comes to our plant,” said Carlson. “In a one kilogram sample … there can be no more than one kernel of wheat, barley or rye.”
Oats and oat based ingredients are a relatively new addition to the diets of people with celiac disease and gluten intolerance.
For years, dieticians and health experts believed that oats would trigger symptoms related to gluten intolerance.
More recently, however, health officials and celiac groups have endorsed the moderate use of oats, as long as purity is assured and there is no contamination by other cereal grains.
Avena began procuring and processing pure oats in 2008 and now operates the largest dedicated pure oat facility in North America. About 80 percent of the company’s production is shipped to the United States.
Pure oats must not be grown on land that has produced wheat, barley or rye for the previous three years. Production must follow strict protocols and must be harvested with dedicated equipment to protect against contamination and mixing with other cereal crops.
Cream Hill Estates, located in Montreal, is another company that sells pure oat products and supplies pure oat ingredients to manufacturers of gluten free foods.
Beth Armour, the company’s co-president, said Cream Hill’s sales have increased 50 to 100 percent each year since it began selling pure oat products in 2006.
Last year, the company sold about 75,000 tonnes of product.
For the first three years, most of the company’s production was sold as market-ready goods through retail channels. Last year, however, the company sold more ingredients to specialty food manufacturers targeting the gluten free market.
According to Armour, the company procures most of its pure oats from growers in southwestern Ontario, but last year it also offered production contracts to growers in other parts of Ontario and in Manitoba.
Expanding production into new regions will limit the company’s risk if crops fail in one part of the country. It has considered contracting production with growers in Saskatchewan but Armour says transportation costs are a limiting factor.
“We do know that Saskatchewan is probably the best growing area … but when we go further west, of course, we might save on the actual product or the oats but the shipping costs just get too high.”
Armour said the company expects to contract more than 100,000 tonnes of hulless oat production in 2010.
Producers who sign a contract can expect a premium of roughly 50 percent over conventional oat markets, she said.
