Ghana’s cashew apples get a second life | News

Sunyani, Ghana – At harvest time in Ghana’s cashew-growing communities, the bottom beneath the bushes tells a well-recognized story.

Whereas farmers rigorously gather the nuts that will probably be offered to consumers, the fleshy cashew apples connected to them are sometimes left behind. Inside hours, the fruit begins to spoil, turning a doubtlessly invaluable a part of the harvest into waste.

Ghana is one in every of Africa’s main cashew producers, harvesting roughly 1 / 4 of one million tonnes of uncooked cashew nuts every year. The bushes additionally produce much more cashew apples than nuts and business officers say a lot of the fruit is rarely processed or offered.

For many years, the cashew apple has remained largely outdoors the market financial system. Farmers have had few consumers for the fruit, and with out close by processing services, transporting it earlier than it spoils is troublesome.

Now, researchers, farmers and business leaders consider the discarded fruit might grow to be a brand new supply of earnings for rural communities – if Ghana can construct the techniques wanted to gather, course of and promote it.

From waste to worth

For Francisca Aba Ansah, the chance grew to become clear after subject visits revealed the dimensions of cashew apple waste. She is a meals post-harvest scientist on the CSIR-Meals Analysis Institute and challenge lead for MA-CASH, a analysis initiative targeted on increasing worth from cashew manufacturing.

“MA-CASH principally means Maximising Beneficial properties from Cashew Manufacturing for Youth Growth,” Ansah informed Al Jazeera. “The challenge began by wanting on the stage of waste in rising areas and the processing choices out there.”

Working with farming communities, researchers developed merchandise together with juice, juice blends, sausages, bagels and different meals created from cashew apples.

One of many greatest challenges was the fruit’s excessive tannin content material, which impacts style and client acceptance.

“Cashew apples have excessive tannin content material, so we did a variety of analysis to cut back the tannin and minimise the anti-nutrient results when individuals eat the merchandise,” she mentioned.

An excellent larger barrier was the fruit’s brief shelf life. Recent cashew apples can spoil inside 24 hours of harvest, making transport from farms to processing centres problematic.

“If you harvest cashew apples, inside 24 hours it goes dangerous,” she mentioned. “We developed the know-how that enables farmers to maintain it for as much as six days earlier than it’s shipped to the processing centre. When it will get there, it may be refrigerated for the entire 12 months for manufacturing.”

The preservation know-how has been examined by means of pilot work below the challenge and will make business assortment and processing attainable for the primary time in lots of farming communities.

The challenge can also be exploring low season earnings alternatives, together with beekeeping below cashew plantations.

“Throughout the low season, when you’ll not be working there, you’ll be able to really do beekeeping,” she mentioned. “The honey that comes from cashew has good high quality, so farmers can nonetheless have their enterprise operating.”

Past the nut

For some farmers, the concept of making worth from cashew apples is already shifting from risk to apply.

Samuel Nortey Adumoah has experimented with turning the fruit into pito, a standard native drink, in addition to wine and different drinks.

Like many farmers, he as soon as considered the cashew apple as little greater than a by-product. Now he believes it might grow to be an vital supply of earnings.

“Cashew drinks have sturdy market potential,” Adumoah informed Al Jazeera. “I name on traders to return into this house to help us as a result of it is rather profitable.”

His expertise displays each the promise and the problem of constructing a brand new business. Farmers can create merchandise, however scaling these concepts requires funding, infrastructure and dependable hyperlinks to markets.

The lacking provide chain

Raphael Godlove Ahenu, Nationwide Coordinator of Cashew Watch Ghana, says many farmers nonetheless want help to grasp the financial prospects past the nut.

The organisation has been working with farmers, notably within the Bono Area, to advertise worth addition and encourage communities to discover processing alternatives.

“For the previous two years, now we have been mobilising farmers into teams and educating them on tips on how to course of cashew into fruit juice and different merchandise, aside from promoting the nut to overseas firms,” Ahenu informed Al Jazeera.

However he warns that processing services alone is not going to assure success.

“This isn’t the primary time a cashew processing manufacturing facility has been established,” Ahenu mentioned. “Some personal firms have arrange processing vegetation, however sadly many have struggled or collapsed as a result of they might not safe sufficient provide from farmers.”

Many farmers rely upon advance financing from export consumers supplying main markets equivalent to India and Vietnam, which frequently determines the place their produce is offered.

“More often than not, overseas consumers give farmers delicate loans through the low season,” he mentioned. “Earlier than the cashew season arrives, farmers have already taken cash and are compelled to promote to those consumers.”

With out various financing, farmers could wrestle to take part in new worth chains, even when alternatives emerge.

Creating demand

Monetary consultants consider cashew apple processing might create further income streams and strengthen farmers’ skill to entry credit score.

Aaron Owusu Nketia, a monetary adviser and mortgage officer working with cashew farmers within the Bono Area, mentioned native processing might enhance confidence amongst farmers and lenders.

“If the federal government is ready to set up processing factories for cashew upcycling, it’ll assist farmers with further income streams to pay again their loans, and it’ll encourage banks to present extra loans to farmers,” Nketia informed Al Jazeera.

However creating an business requires greater than producing new merchandise. Cashew apple juice and different merchandise should compete with established drinks and persuade customers {that a} fruit as soon as handled as waste has business worth.

For Robert Abongo, a instructor and group help activist working with farmers in Sekyeredumasi in Ashanti Area, consciousness stays a significant problem.

“Most farmers rely solely on the nuts,” Abongo informed Al Jazeera. “The federal government should intensify training on worth addition so farmers will probably be knowledgeable and plan with the fruits in thoughts as an alternative of relying solely on the seeds.”

A strategic useful resource

The federal government believes cashew apple processing might grow to be a part of Ghana’s wider agricultural transformation agenda.

Andrews Osei Okrah, Chief Government Officer of the Tree Crops Growth Authority, mentioned the fruit is more and more being recognised as extra than simply an agricultural by-product.

“As soon as considered a by-product, the cashew apple is now a strategic financial useful resource with immense potential to drive agro-industrialisation, create jobs, enhance rural livelihoods and contribute to Ghana’s financial development,” Osei Okrah informed Al Jazeera.

Ghana now has a chance however should deal with implementation, mentioned John Y. Kupagme, a researcher and head of the Agriculture Sector on the African Chamber of Content material Producers.

“The coverage framework gives a stable basis. What is required now’s coordinated motion and sustained funding,” Kupagme informed Al Jazeera.

The following harvest

The push to develop a cashew apple financial system comes as Ghana searches for tactics to diversify agricultural earnings.

For years, Ghana’s cashew farmers measured the worth of their harvest by the nuts they carried away.

Now, they’re starting to have a look at the fruit that was as soon as left behind. Whether or not it turns into a brand new supply of earnings will rely upon if Ghana can construct a worth chain that works from the farm to the manufacturing facility and at last to customers.

As one other harvest season approaches, the cashew apples will as soon as once more fall beneath the bushes. The query is whether or not they are going to be left to spoil, or collected, processed and offered because the crop that Ghana has been overlooking all alongside.

“We’ve got the fruits. We’ve got the concepts. We simply want the funding to make it work,” Ahenu mentioned.