Coffee, tea, seasonings, and tobacco
When it comes to the drying and roasting of coffee, tea, seasonings, and tobacco, which are traditionally considered to be upmarket or "fine" products, factors that play an important role in processing, besides efficiency, include current trends and fashions, societal perceptions, and not least health-related and legal aspects. In the case of luxury products and gourmet foods, there is a significant trend for qualities such as sustainability, fair trade, and the promotion of more people and environmentally-friendly cultivation, harvesting, and processing methods.
Luxury products like coffee and tobacco require consideration of health-related risks and trends - together, of course, with the associated risks and standards. For tobacco there are legal restrictions, taxes, and subsidies throughout the world that exert an enormous influence on investment and on the economic survival of the first part of the supply chain. Nevertheless, technology is the main factor here as well, and both in general industrialization and in the various drying, curing, and roasting processes, ventilation plays a decisive role.