From farm to waste — what can we learn from the mango season in Nigeria?
2020 has brought a bumper harvest for many mango farmers in Nigeria. But in the wake of Covid-19, this is not a source of good news for most farmers. Disruptions to supply chains resulting from pandemic containment measures are only adding to an array of existing challenges for farmers, including limited access to markets, high transportation costs, and shifts in consumer preferences. This heralds more wastage of the mango crop in the new production season.
Over the last 5 years, mango production has been on the rise in Africa, with West Africa producing about 1.5 million tons of mangoes annually, about 4% of global production.
At the same time, post-harvest losses for the West Africa region are estimated at a massive 50–80%. This implies that the region is only able to export about 100,000 tons of fresh mangoes, and process about 50,000 tons of mango for the local market each year.
Mango, a fruit with unexploited opportunities in Benue State
Last week, I received a number of mentions on a viral tweet from Benue Elites. Depicting images of rotting mangoes, the tweet highlights the true cost of post-harvest losses in Nigeria’s agricultural sector, and especially in Benue State, the nation’s acclaimed food basket.
Seeing the images of rotting mangoes attached to the tweet, I was worried about the livelihoods of farmers, traders, and other players along the mango value chain.
It is true that fruits such as mango are perishable products and, in the absence of sufficient demand from consumers, post-harvest losses are inevitable. In many cases, farmers and traders are left with no option than to allow their produce to rot, or give it to away to neighbours. Sometimes, sellers are forced to literally throw away their stock to consumers at ridiculously low prices.
In a short video documentary, Tsekohol Denison, an agro-blogger, and Founder of Denkol Farms, interviewed mango farmers and traders in Makurdi, Benue state. One of the traders lamented that due to the Covid-19 pandemic, both farmers and traders are experiencing low sales and higher post-harvest losses compared to previous mango seasons when demand is higher.
Tsekohol added that both the farmers and traders are left with no option than to sell at low prices, with a full basket of mango (approximately 60kg) selling for about 500 Naira (1.29 USD). This is about one-third of the price of a single mango in countries like Belgium, where a mango sells for about 2.99 Euro.
Both the tweet and the video have attracted scores of messages empathizing with the massive losses in the sector, with many calling for appropriate actions across the entire mango value chain. In one response, Opeyemi Babalola emphasized on the need for the state and federal governments, as well as private industry, to establish a state-owned mango processing company in key locations in Benue state, with retail outlets in the 36 states of Nigeria.
Capitalizing on value addition
For many agro-commodities, value addition is one of the best options for cutting losses incurred across the mango value chain, while helping to open up new markets, and boost revenue. To curb post-harvest losses for mango, for example, fresh fruits can be harvested in their prime and processed into diverse products such as juice, frozen mango cubes, and mango chips.
Currently, a ton of frozen mango cubes sells between US$800-$1000 on Alibaba, while one litre of mango nectar juice sells for 350 Naira (0.90 USD) on Jumia Nigeria.
In the wake to address the food systems, Nigeria needs to rapidly introduce fruit processing clusters and new storage solutions across its agricultural system to curb post-harvest losses and boost livelihoods.
Written by John Agboola
This article is part of Covid-19 Food/Future, an initiative under TMG ThinkTank for Sustainability’s SEWOH Lab project (https://www.tmg-thinktank.com/sewoh-lab). It aims at providing a unique and direct insight into the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on national and local food systems. Also follow @CovidFoodFuture, our Video Diaries From Nairobi, and @TMG_think on Twitter. Funding for this initiative is provided by BMZ, the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.
