Marzuki Pelopor Tapai Segar Dalam Bungkusan Plastik

ARKIB : 05/11/2008

KULIM 4 Nov. - Ketika rakan-rakan lain memilih untuk menghabiskan masa bersama keluarga selepas bersara, Marzuki Abdul Rahman pula lebih senang menggunakan ilmu dan pengalaman yang ada untuk menceburi bidang keusahawanan.

Bekas pesara kerajaan yang berusia 59 tahun itu memilih untuk mengusahakan bengkel menghasilkan makanan pencuci mulut iaitu tapai segar di rumahnya di Kampung Terat Batu, Padang Serai dekat sini.

Menurut Marzuki, ilham untuk menghasilkan tapai segar timbul setelah didorong oleh ibu bapanya yang sebelum ini menjual kuih itu secara kecil-kecilan.

"Keluarga saya ada pengalaman lebih 50 tahun dalam menghasilkan kuih-muih tradisional termasuk tapai," katanya ketika ditemui di rumahnya di sini baru-baru ini.

Marzuki memberitahu, dengan bermodalkan wang hasil persaraannya, dia membeli beberapa peralatan asas untuk membuat kuih-muih.

"Saya cuba bermacam-macam kuih tetapi akhirnya mendapati tapai lebih mudah kerana ia merupakan kuih yang paling sesuai memandangkan belum dipasarkan secara meluas," katanya.
Katanya, tanpa rasa jemu, dia mencuba pelbagai kaedah termasuk mengubahsuai cara pembungkusan produk.

"Saya ambil masa hampir tiga tahun untuk mencipta bungkusan tapai. Macam-macam cara digunakan termasuk dari daun pisang dan plastik," katanya.

Bagaimanapun, Marzuki berkata, pembungkusan produk dengan plastik lebih sesuai kerana tahan lama, bersih dan kelihatan lebih kemas.

"Sejak menggunakan bungkusan plastik, produk saya mula mendapat perhatian umum.
"Daripada 1,000 bungkusan sebulan, kini ia telah meningkat kepada 8,000 hingga 10,000 bungkus sebulan," katanya.

Tambahnya setiap bungkusan tapai seberat 60 gram dijual pada harga 60 sen.
"Salah satu keistimewaan tapai yang dihasilkan ialah boleh disimpan dalam peti sejuk dalam tempoh panjang iaitu antara dua minggu hingga sebulan tanpa rosak," jelasnya.

Ketika ditanya tentang pantang larang yang perlu dipatuhi ketika menghasil tapai, dia menjelaskan, tiada sebarang larangan seperti yang didakwa oleh kebanyakan pembuat tapai tradisional.

"Semua dibuat secara sistematik dan peralatan moden. Oleh itu, ia tiada kaitan dengan pantang larang," katanya.
Ujar Marzuki, dia kini mampu berbangga kerana tapai segar yang dihasilkan itu pernah ditempah pelbagai agensi kerajaan termasuk dibawa oleh atlet kontinjen Malaysia ke acara Sukan Komanwel di Kanada beberapa tahun lalu.

"Pelanggan utama saya ialah kalangan pegawai dan anggota polis terutama di Bukit Aman. Sebut saja tapai segar Warisan Jitu, pastinya mereka akan tahu bahawa ia datang dari Kulim," jelasnya.
Tambahnya, berkat dan usaha gigihnya itu, Jabatan Pertanian Daerah Kulim pada tahun lalu meluluskan bantuan sebanyak RM35,000 bagi membolehkan beliau meluaskan lagi bengkel membuat tapai.

Katanya, dia juga bercadang untuk menceburi bidang menghasilkan ragi pada masa akan datang.
"Pada masa ini bekalan ragi untuk dibuat tapai amat terhad dan hanya diperoleh daripada Institut Penyelidikan dan Kemajuan Pertanian Malaysia (MARDI)," katanya.

Dia berkata, penghasilan ragi secara besar-besaran boleh membantu melahirkan ramai lagi usahawan tapai pada masa akan datang.

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Harga Minyak Vs Harga Barang

Salam,

Terima kasih kerana masih setia mengunjungi blog kami yang serba kekurangan ini.

Sejak beberapa minggu ni, banyak cerita kurang enak kedengaran pasal penurunan harga minyak dipasaran dunia dan kerajaan kita juga telah 7 kali menurunkan harga minyak. Tetapi, haraga barang masih lagi tinggi dan tak turun-turun.

Namun realitinya, kenaikan mendadak tempohari telah mengakibatkan ledakan harga runcit semua jenis komoditi dipasaran. Mungkin ini menjadi punca kejatuhan ekonomi di masa depan.

Banyak juga SMS diterima dari pelanggan setia dan rakan-rakan membincangkan kesan ekonomi terhadap kehidupan seharian kami. Ramai juga yang tidak berpuashati dengan pelan tindakan kerajaan yang tidak memantau secara keseluruhan paten harga barangan serta monopoli para pembekal terhadap sesuatu barangan.

Sebagai contoh, kilang kami bergantung kepada bahan mentah yang diimport. Kenaikan mendadak harga bahan mentah tidak membolehkan kami menaikkan harga barang kami kerana suasana pasaran dan kuasa membeli sudah berkurangan berbanding dulu. Kos pengangkutan juga telah naik sekitar 30% walaupun harga minyak diturunkan. Alasan kos selenggara yang telah naik serta kenaikan gaji memang tidak dapat dielakkan dan amat munasabah sekarang ini.

Oleh itu, bila melihat keadaan ekonomi yang semakin gawat dengan berita pemberhentian pekerja sektor tertentu akan mengakibatkan kuasa membeli akan terus menurun dan perniagaan peruncitan semakin lembab.

Dalam situasi sekarang, orang awam akan menyalahkan peruncit kerana harga yang semakin mahal padahal harga minyak dah turun. Realitinya, pemborong atau orang tengah secara senyap-senyap mengambil kesempatan mencari untung berlebihan melalui cara yang tidak beretika. Akhirnya, pengeluar atau pengilang yang dipertanggungjawabkan. Pening juga.....

Loughborough University Research Finds Tempe Linked to better Memory

People who eat high levels of some soy products, including tofu and other so-called ‘superfoods’, may be at an increased risk of memory loss.

Scientists from the Universities of Loughborough and Oxford, funded by the Alzheimer’s Research Trust, worked with Indonesian colleagues to investigate the effects of high soy consumption in 719 elderly Indonesians living in urban and rural regions of Java.

The researchers’ findings, to be published in ‘Dementias and Geriatric Cognitive Disorders’ later this month, include evidence that a high consumption of tofu is associated with worsening memory, particularly among people aged 68 or older.

Lead researcher, Professor Eef Hogervorst of Loughborough University said: “Soy consumption is on the increase in the West and is often promoted as a ‘superfood’. Soy products are rich in micronutrients called phytoestrogens, but it is not entirely clear what their effect on the aging brain is.

“They have similar effects to oestrogen which may offer neuroprotection to the middle-aged and young but not to over 65s for whom it could heighten risk of dementia and lower memory function.”

Intriguingly, the researchers also found that consuming tempe, a fermented soy product made from whole soy bean, is associated with better memory.Professor Hogervorst said the beneficial effect of tempe might be related to its high levels of folate, which is known to reduce dementia risk.

More....

Biotech and the science of tapai-making

DATUK Dr Jamaludin Jarjis is trying hard to make Malaysians understand what biotechnology is all about.

And he wants to use tapai, the country's age-old fermented rice recipe, as an example when he explains the concept to his constituents in Rompin. The Science, Technology and Innovation Minister, who was at the Bio 2004 Convention in San Francisco last week, must have been so overwhelmed by the complexities of modern biotechnology that he is worried that it simply will not catch on where it matters — in the villages and jungle fringes where natural resources are in abundance.

"Let's demystify biotech," he kept on saying to people around him while in San Francisco.This is probably where tapai comes in. The classic Malay food is a by-product of biotechnology of sorts since its preparation involves the use of yeast to ferment glutinous rice — just as in the early days of biotech when yeast was also used to ferment beer and leaven bread in Egypt in 4,000BC.

It is biotech since it makes use of living cells and living particles to solve problems or make useful products. In the case of tapai-making, yeast is a living fungus and it is used to modify food, which is glutinous rice.Or how about tongkat ali? Because this wild root too can be used as an ingredient in pharmaceutical products to enhance vitality.

Jamaludin, or Datuk JJ as he is more popularly known, and everybody else in his ministry must be wishing that biotech is as simple as that. But it is too complicated to the non-discerning— even if Biotech for Dummies or Biotech Made Easy books are available in the market.And no matter what scientists say, biotechnology must be one of the most boring subjects to talk about to a mass audience. Laymen who were at the San Francisco convention should know.

Besides being highly technical, the subject is so dull and dreary, perhaps only fractionally more interesting than rocket science. Or watching grass grow.What do you expect when you are all the time fed with terms you didn't even know existed, like genome, abzymes, ribozymes and retinoblastomas? But somehow we all know the importance. Biotech has been hailed as the new engine of growth and some predict that it could even be bigger than the information and communication technology revolution that crept in in a big way several years ago and changed our lives.

That's why Jamaludin is taking it as a challenge to make this concept more appealing to the masses, especially since the country, being abundantly blessed with the potential, is directly in the path of the biotech gale."I want to be able to go back to my constituency in Rompin and talk about biotechnology in a language everyone understands because this science is all around us," he says.

An engineer by training, Jamaludin reckons he has to use simple yet far-reaching examples if he ever wants to break new ground in his biotech-for-all campaign. And food is close to the hearts of most peopole.The economic opportunities provided by biotech are said to be enormous — more so over the last 10 to 15 years with the progress made in information and communication technology that has opened the way for new discoveries and new drugs to treat killer diseases like cancer, AIDS and hypertension.

Jamaludin believes Malaysia can tap into its resources and available infrastructure to make vast inroads in this field and bring great economic gains to the country. Providing clinical trial facilities to research conducted by big firms is one. Another is making use of its natural resources, especially those found in the richness of the forests where all kinds of herbs and plants with medicinal value can be found.

Hempedu beruang (thottea), for instance is much sought after for its intrinsic medicinal value, especially for the treatment of skin diseases. A joint research project is being carried out at Berkeley University in California on this plant and this alone brings enormous benefit to Malaysia as it also exposes Malaysian scientists to research and development methods carried out in well-equipped and established surroundings. Of course, the bottomline is economics since several countries in the region, especially Singapore and India, are going at full stride to develop their biotech industries which are said to be bringing them revenue of up to US$10 billion (RM38 billion) a year.

The demystification of biotech is also necessary to make people less apprehensive of things like genetically-modified food or "frankenstein food" that put many people off.A university professor says the so-called environmental activists hold protests about biotech products simply because they don't understand what it is all about. "All they think is that food is now being produced in labs and these are unsafe."They don't realise that some of the raw vegetables from the farms that they eat contain a high residue of pesticides and that biotech has somehow come up with a process to overcome this problem relating to pesticide poisoning," he says.

He gives examples: Worldwide biotech crop acreage has risen 15 per cent to hit 167.2 million acres in 18 countries. Brazil and the Philippines grew biotech crops for the first time last year. Also, Indonesia allows consumption of imported biotech foods and China and Uganda accept biotech crop imports.The United Kingdom has also approved its first commercial biotech crop in eight years. The crop is a biotech herbicide-resistant corn used for cattle feed.The US Environmental Protection Agency has also approved the first transgenic rootworm-resistant corn, which may save farmers US$1 billion annually in crop losses and pesticide use.