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Banana snack industry goes stale

Not so long ago, the Central Java town of Majenang was famous for being the home of sale pisang, a unique snack made with bananas, but recently the market changed and the local snack industry faded to a fraction of its former success. Majenang, one of 23 districts in Cilacap regency in the far west of the province - bordering with Banjar and Ciamis regencies in West Java - has about 30 small factories producing the snack. Before the 1998 economic crisis, there were around 100 such producers, leading Cilacap administration to come up with the idea of making the snack the icon of Majenang. But with the crisis, the plan hit snags and many cottage industries were forced out of business. More than a decade later, the situation has yet to improve. "Before the crisis I could sell 2 or 3 tons of fried banana sweets to Jakarta. But things are difficult now," Yayat, a 61-year-old sale pisang business owner, told The Jakarta Post in Majenang. Today, Yayat produces only about 200 kilograms of sale pisang a month, and 99 percent of this is sold in Majenang. The snacks are sold in 250-gram packages, each costing around Rp 25,000 (US$2). Another snack producer, Juremi, said that before the crisis she could send 2 tons of sale pisang to Jakarta, Bandung and Surabaya each month. "Now we only sell sale pisang for the local market," the 60-year-old said. Juremi said most of the snack producers were struggling to survive. "What's important is that business survives. If there are buyers in the city, that's enough. Sometimes we get an order from outside the city, but this is unreliable," she said. "Once, a distributor from outside the city wanted to place an order, but the price he offered was too low to cover our production costs. Rather than suffering losses, we preferred not to take it." Making sale pisang does not take long. Ripe bananas are cut into slices and dried in the sun. "If the sun is bright, the bananas will dry out in two days. But in a rainy season like this, it takes about four days," Juremi said. The dried bananas are then smeared with flour and deep-fried. After being drained, the banana chips are ready to be packaged and sold. The sale pisang business has supported many, including farmers and traders who sell raw bananas to cottage industries in Majenang, as well as banana snack makers such as Juremi and Yayat, and the vendors. Majenang district head, Heru Susedyo, said he was aware of the stagnant business situation. "Sale pisang was once so popular that the Cilacap administration planned to make it the icon of Majenang city, but the plan could not be realized because sales keep decreasing." http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2009/03/06/

Tuesday 2 December 2008

how many calories in a banana

shut 30 years ago. (I didn't know him then). People sadly follow the dieting myths out of desperation. And forgo the good, common sense of maintaining optimum weight. Here's the lowdown. To lose weight you must have mental focus and eat a well-rounded diet. You must cut back on the food you eat, after all, that's what got you here to begin with. You also need to run, not walk away from the Top 10 Weight Loss Myths below. Myth 1: Skip Meals To Lose Weight While we've heard about the importance of breakfast there are still so many people who go without breakfast, lunch, or even dinner for that matter. These are known as "grazers". A grazer will snick-snack on food throughout the day, while never eating a real meal. Grazing can be detrimental to weight loss efforts because the tendency is to eat quick and non-nutritious foods, which are oftentimes high in fat or high in carbohydrates. Recommendation: If eating at a predetermined mealtime is inconvenient, eat meals when it is convenient. For example, if you get up at 11:00 AM and have classes from noon until 4:30, eat a meal before and after class. (Notice, I didn't say eat a snack. You're not a cow, don't graze.) Eating meals will keep your metabolism running at optimum levels, which will prevent a drop in the metabolic rate. When our body has a decreased food intake the metabolic rate lowers. Eating meals will also prevent binging on non-nutritious foods later in the day. Myth 2: Foods, Like Cabbage, Can Make You Lose WeightYou just may lose weight. But it would more than likely be due to inadequate nutrition and calorie intake. This does not mean you'd lose fat. The body goes into a type of panic mode when placed on starvation-type diets. In this situation muscle tissue would be used for energy in addition to fat storage. This will leave the dieter looking flabby and under toned. Not a very attractive picture. Recommendation: I have 2 recommendations for this one. The first is a product with fucoxanthin in it. Fucoxanthin has been shown to have an adaptive thermogenic effect on fat burning. Helping to lose belly fat in particular. I have access to a fucoxanthin product made with a process called FucoPure which is 10 times stronger than fucoxanthin and 1000 times more potent than fucoxanthin normally occurring in seaweed (that's where it comes from). You Can Find That Info below the article. Second, even if you hate exercising with a passion. Even if you'd rather slice off body parts than exercise, even if you say to me "Sarah I am much too heavy to exercise." Listen ... I'm not asking you to run a marathon. I'm not asking you to go to a gym and do heavy weight lifting. I'm not asking for you to take your position in the front row of a horrific aerobics class. I'm asking you, do you want to die before you're supposed to? If the answer is "no", and I sure hope it is, I'm asking you to take baby steps. How do you eat a prime rib roast? One bite at a time. If you're totally sedentary, take 10 minutes out of your day and walk the block. You can do 10 minutes. And the follo
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