I'm Dutch and have been living in Auvergne since 2004. I set up my own market research company in 1996. Since 2013, I've been working with the German NGO GIZ in Nepal. To stimulate the PPAM sector, they are engaged in programs to encourage growers to cultivate the plants, exporters to work better with the farmers in a transparent way and to improve the distillation technique to a higher quality and more efficient. At present there are around 100 medicinal plants in Nepal that are sold raw to Indian traders for extremely low prices, with many more plants at risk. With market research, training and workshops, Nepalese entrepreneurs can distill in Nepal for export essential oils, powders and other finished products to India, China, the USA, Europe and other new markets. In France and Germany I represent Annapurna Aroma for essential oils. I work with Himalayan Bio Trade (HBTL) for vegetable oils (sea buckthorn), timur pepper and with a French importer we carried out a fair trade project for wintergreen EO in 2017.
