Flour Milling Operation

At FLOUR AND BREAD PRODUCT BARAKAT HARIWA's mill, producing high-quality wheat flour means paying very close attention to details at every step of the milling process. Please take some time and review our quality process from start to finish.

OUR MILLING PROCESS

When we procure the grain, they will typically contain impurities. So before processing, foreign contaminants and pollutants that have entered the grain during harvesting, transportation, and storage, must be removed. This is a careful process, which has a direct impact on the quality of flour and bran produced.

The milling process involves the removal of layers of endosperm from the outer casing, and the bran. We separate this process so that we can control the most critical aspects of the milling process, such as particle size, starch damage, and flour streaming. Our state-of-the-art milling facility and process enables us to produce flour of the highest quality and consistency.

Step 1: Grain Receiving and Storage

Wheat is received at our mill by trucks year-round with the July wheat harvest being our busiest. Most of the local wheat comes from the western part of Afghanistan. This includes grain that comes locally from Herat and Badghis province. Our imported wheat is sourced from the northern shore of Kazakhstan, and sometimes Turkmenistan.  Each incoming load of grain in each truck is individually sampled and quality tested for moisture, test weight, foreign material, insect infestation, and sprout damage. Any shipment not meeting our quality standards is immediately rejected.

After testing is completed and the quality is acceptable, the wheat is then unloaded in one of our three-grain unloading pits. During harvest time and winter season, any wet wheat (moisture exceeding 13.5%) is transferred to our continuous flow gas dryer, where it is dried to less than 13.5% moisture for long term storage. Wheat is then transferred to our Concrete Silos, where it is disinfected and then cooled to maintain quality while in long term storage.

Step 2: Cleaning House

Once the wheat is adequately aged and cooled, it is transferred out of long-term storage into our mill wheat silo. From here it enters the vital process of grain cleaning (see below), where all foreign materials are removed. After the wheat is thoroughly cleaned, it is automatically tempered to a uniform moisture level for milling.

Our De-Stoner CSTA thoroughly cleans and de-stones all wheat as it passes through the main cleaning stage on its way to the flour mill.

Step 3: Milling

After spending eight hours in each of the mill tempering bins, the wheat is scoured and aspirated one final time before being metered into the 1st Break roller mill through our electronic wheat scale.

Once in the mill, the wheat is transformed into high-quality soft wheat flour through a continuous process of grinding, conveying, sifting, and dusting. Flour quality is maintained throughout the milling process by constant break checks on all the grinding and reduction passages.

In addition to flour, three other products are produced from the milling process: wheat bran, wheat middlings, and wheat germ, all used in the livestock feed industry.

Step 4: Finished Flour

Finished flour is continuously collected from the sifters during the milling process. All flour is fortified and then blended before entering the re-bolt sifter, where the finished flour is given one final sifting to eliminate any impurities. Once finished, the flour is automatically weighed on its way to packing.

Throughout the day, several finished flour samples are drawn off the mill for testing in our house laboratory. Every sample is visually checked and then tested for protein, Gluten, Zeleny, Water absorption, moisture, and ash content.

Finally, finished flour is loaded in one of our 25-ton trucks, and weighed on the weigh scanner for on-time delivery to the customer any time, day or night.