The snail farm Lokofermi, located in Ozurgeti is for sale. As stated in the statement, the total area of the land plot is 3 hectares, while the farm is located on an area of one hectare.
The co-owner of the farm, Aleksandre Ratishvili, told bm.ge that the snail farm was built in compliance with international standards. An irrigation system is also installed. As for the price, it will depend on the agreement with the potential buyer, since the company benefits from cheap agro credit and has signed a long-term credit agreement with "ProCredit Bank".
"The price can be different, it will depend on the agreement. If the interested person wants to buy out the entire company, there will be a different price, but if he buys only our company's share, then the price will be different. So it can be GEL 100,000 or GEL 700,000. We will be flexible during the negotiations," Aleksandre Ratishvili told BM.GE.
According to him, the harvest per hectare in the farm is about 20 tons of snails under good care conditions. Currently, the Italian variety of snail - MAXIMA is grown. As Ratishvili says, it is possible to grow other varieties as well, for example, Muller.
The building of "Lokofermi" started at the beginning of 2021 with an investment of GEL 0.5 million, so the first harvest was received in June of this year. As Ratishvili mentioned, this year's harvest amounted to four tons.
"There is a great demand for this product in Europe. The snail business is developing quite rapidly in Georgia. This is a prospective direction focused on exports, which will contribute to the growth of the employment rate, as well as the inflow of foreign currency in the country," Ratishvili explained.
The snail farm currently employs five people.
