Idea 227 of 500. Cluster 11: Cinnamon and the spice garden
Peeler training schools, since the skill is disappearing and it is the whole value
The mechanism, from the book
The imitation out-earns the original. Vietnam earns more from cassia than Sri Lanka does from true cinnamon, because the cassia arrives on the shelf as a product and the cinnamon arrives at the port as a bale.
Every idea in cluster 11 uses this mechanism.
A first step
Ask 3 master peelers in the south-west how many apprentices they have and what they would charge to train one for a season. Then ask 5 cinnamon processors whether they would pay a trained peeler more, and pay part of the training. The proof is a fee from a master and a processor willing to fund one trainee.
- Who pays first
- A cinnamon processor who cannot find skilled peelers and loses grade and price every season because the quills are cut badly.
- What leaves today
- The peeling skill is the whole value of the quill, and as peelers age out, the island risks losing the one thing cassia cannot copy.
The idea and the mechanism are from the book. The first step was written for this site as a suggestion; if you know a better one, say so.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
The only test any idea on this site has to pass. The four rules that go with it are here.
In the book
- Ch. FourThe Same Failure, Four Times
Why cassia out-earns true cinnamon - Ch. ElevenThe Mechanisms
The single desk that ends undercutting and funds brand and quality
More from cluster 11
- 221Cinnamon quills in retail packs with the grade printed, since almost no consumer knows the grades exist
- 222Cinnamon sticks as a branded gift, tied and boxed, sold at every airport in the world where we have a shop
- 223Cinnamon-leaf and bark oils bottled for the aromatherapy trade under a Sri Lankan name
- 224Cinnamon-infused honey, sugar and salt as a range
- 225A "true cinnamon" education campaign run by producers, aimed at bakers and chefs abroad
- 226Cinnamon farm stays in the south-west, where the peeling is the show
Idea 227 of the 500 in the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? Every one can be started by one person, one family or one small firm.