helos is now europe's biggest stevia plantation. to begin with we knew nothing about how to cultivate stevia step by step we discovered how to make sure it grows well. but every knock on. the farmers consulted scientists who told them more about the plants properties. as consumer demand for the sweetener grows farmers are keen to learn more about growing as. a kilo of dried stevia leaves patches between two and seven euro's depending on quality a large portion of exports go to germany and france demand for the sweetener in powdered crystal form is high too but there's only one factory that prothesis steve yeah and it's located in front unsurprisingly the co-operative wants to open its own processing plant in greece members are hoping the e.u. will help them out with subsidies. for the next five years planting biased on new machinery and a bigger white house so we can collectively. process our state. and have a better product. someone else pinning his hopes on more cooperation and quality is andre s. kyra phillips his stere farm it's

shift from what they are currently farming to stevia?we have had so far. the farmers have been calmed by so far. the farmers have been calmed by so many people, so we had to do a lot of work in terms of convincing them to give them the confidence we we re them to give them the confidence we were there to stay, we were not going to run away. that was the reason we started with our own farms. we became farmers ourselves. you started this company about three yea rs you started this company about three years ago, how much has grown since then? it has grown a lot. when we started, we started with general product so we were looking at the margin market, ginseng and other crops as well. then we came across stevia and it was interesting from many perspectives. one is the diabetic angle, my mother is a diabetic. the growing numbers are astounding. if you look at the w h a survey of the leading causes of death in 2000, the figure is nowhere and today it is the third leading cause of death in the world. and today it is the third leading cause of de

hell us is now europe's biggest stevia plantation. to begin with we knew nothing about how to cultivate stevia but step by step we discovered how to make sure it grows well. but i've not got. the farmers consulted scientists who told them more about the plants properties. as consumer demand for the sweetener grows farmers are keen to learn more about growing as a kilo of dried stevia leaves purchased between two and seven euro's depending on quality a large portion of exports go to germany and france demand for the sweetener in powdered crystal form is high too but there's only one factory that prothesis steve yeah and it's located in front unsurprisingly of the co-operative wants to open its own processing plant in greece members are hoping the e.u. will help them out with subsidies. for the next five years planting biased on new machinery and a bigger warehouse so we can collectively. process. and have a better product. someone else pinning his hopes on more cooperation and quality is andreas paraphilia his dairy farm it's a two hou