A familiar face at Cigi, Ashok Sarkar is also well known internationally and was recognized this spring for outstanding contributions to the industry
Many work quietly behind the scenes on farmers’ behalf, ensuring the work they start in the field produces optimum results for the dinner table.
None more so than Ashok Sarkar, head of milling technology at Canadian International Grains Institute (Cigi), who helps make sure Canadian wheat customers get the optimum results from the flour they produce.
Sarkar is credited with developing Cigi’s pilot mill into a global centre of excellence but it is his international work that has resulted in his peers referring to him as “the milling equivalent of a rock star.”
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When Sarkar isn’t operating Cigi’s pilot mill, he could be virtually anywhere in the world where industrial flour millers seek his technical expertise.
His 40-year career began in the flour mills of India and Switzerland before he joined Cigi in 1979.
A key member of the Cigi team, Sarkar’s job is staying in touch with customers of Canadian wheat, providing onsite technical support, and ensuring they’re getting the best results from their wheat purchases. His overseas visits have taken him to flour mills in over 50 countries.
“We’re always trying to see what they think of the quality of the Canadian crop and to see if they have any questions or concerns,” he said in a recent interview.
What he finds so engaging and interesting about the work is that those questions are always changing, says Sarkar.
“We’re able to help people who sometimes don’t know how to find answers… and it’s never just one set of answers,” he said. “The questions always change because the quality always changes. That is very intriguing and also very satisfying when the customers are satisfied.”
The soft-spoken milling expert is widely published and often asked to speak to flour milling conferences and trade shows about milling software he developed to help millers keep their cost down.
As an active member of the International Association of Operative Millers (IAOM) for over 25 years, Sarkar has served as chair of its global strategies committee and recently helped organize a new IAOM South East Asia to help flour millers in that part of the world expand their knowledge about new technologies. The district now includes countries such as Singapore and Indonesia.
One of his particular passions has been the IAOM’s Flour Fortification Initiative, Sarkar says. It’s an organizational network of members including the World Health Organization whose goal is to get more of the world’s flour millers fortifying their flour.
Serving on the FFI’s education committee, he’s helped raise awareness internationally about the benefits of flour fortification while helping millers overcome hurdles to do it. Costs and the technical expertise can be particularly prohibitive especially in developing countries.
Thanks to FFI, nearly a third of all wheat flour produced in the world’s largest mills now fortified, putting healthier grain-based foods within reach for 2.26 billion people.
Sarkar’s contributions to the global milling industry, in particular his efforts to recruit new members and develop the new district for the IAOM, were recognized this past spring when he was presented with the prestigious J. George Kehr Award. The award was presented before about 600 of his colleages attending the May 2 IAOM’s conference and Expo, this year held in Niagara Falls.
