Bogale Borena, 50, is father of six. He recently set up an avocado nursery with the capacity to produce 40,000 grafted seedlings, which he can sell to some of the 300,000 avocado farmers who cultivate the crop in the Sidama and SNNPR regions of Ethiopia. He now employ 14 young people in the nursery.
“I was motivated to grow avocados when a new avocado oil processing plant was established within the Integrated Agro Industries Park (IAIP) near my village. The park employs 490 local people and is the first park of its kind in my region. It works closely with smallholder growers to ensure an adequate supply of avocadoes.”
The Food and Agriculture Agency (FAO) provided technical assistance with the support of the Ministry of Agriculture with the aim of developing a value chain scheme, which includes improving productivity and the quality of commercial avocado varieties.
It also promotes sustainable farming practices for local smallholders. Through careful avocado nursery management, the use of grafting tools and poly ethane bags, he has increased production from 15,000 seedlings in 2020 to 40,000 in 2021. It takes less than a year to grow and sell seedlings, and around three to four years for the plants to yield fruits, so the payoff for me has been immediate.
“I was initially selling seedlings locally for 50 birr ($1) a piece. My projected potential annual earnings are now Birr 2 million (around $44,000). This year, I intend to more than double my production to 100,000 seedlings. By growing grafted avocado seedlings, I have boosted my income and transformed my family’s life.”
As a result, I am planning to improve my house, buy a truck to transport fruits and other agricultural items, and establish a flour mill in my village. This will serve the local community and create employment opportunities for local youth.
“I think my nursery is a good example of how inclusive agricultural value chains can boost youth employment and farmers’ incomes, contributing to the eradication of poverty”, he told to FAO.
Ethiopia becomes a convenient place for Avocado producers and exporters as world avocado demand is on track to triple its growth by 2030 compared to levels in 2010 by reaching 12 metric tons (MT). This fruit is expected to remain the fastest-growing commodity of the major tropical fruits during the reporting period.
Ample global demand and lucrative export unit prices continue to be the main drivers of this growth, stimulating substantial investments in area expansion in both major and emerging production zones.
Avocado production has so far been concentrated in a small number of regions and countries, with the top ten producing areas currently accounting for almost 80 percent of world production.
In response to the rapid growth in global demand, avocado is expected to become the most traded tropical fruit by 2030, reaching 3.9MT of exports and surpassing both pineapples and mangoes in terms of quantity.
Given the high average unit prices of avocado, the total value of world avocado exports would reach an estimated 8.3 billion USD in constant value terms from 2014 to 2016, placing the avocado as one of the most valuable fruits.
Ethiopia has huge potential in avocados and convenient place for investors who wish to be competitive in the international market. The various incentives provided for investors is to enable them to be effective in supplying quality avocado products says Wale Getaneh; Project Manager Fruit and vegetables for the horticulture activities of the Flying Swans Program in Ethiopian Horticulture Producers and Exporters Association.
The growing demand for avocado among global buyers doubled the consumption rate within 15 years thereby paving immense market opportunity to Ethiopian producers, he said adding that, the growing demand for avocado is expected to rise sustainably in European, Asian and the Middle Eastern buyers which provide a potentially high-value market for Ethiopian producers.
As to him, in addition to exporting raw avocado, attempts to avail the global customers with value-added products are also on the rise. From dips to chips, to cosmetics or oils; avocado has a wide range of applications, placing even more stress on demand and necessity for a productive value chain.
Wale further noted that, Ethiopia secured more than 431.6 million USD from exporting over 741,000 kg of avocado to Middle East, Europe, Asia and Africa. Being Ethiopia’s neighbors, Djibouti and Somalia are importing huge amounts of avocado while Belgium is the leading destination of Ethiopia’s avocado and spending over 131.4 million USD for 87,200 kg of avocado between July and October 2021.
Noting absence of advanced technologies which is applied for the production of avocado, the manager noted that, the majority of producers are smallholder farmers who have an average land size of 1-2 hectares. Mecha district in Western Gojam, Butajira in SNNP and Lume district in Oromia states are major areas where improved avocado varieties are produced for export purposes.
“The ability of Ethiopia to become an international player in the avocado market depends on the ability to develop and upscale the entire value chain from inputs, production packing houses, cold storage facilities, transportation and improving access to market information.’’
He highlighted that expansion of Ethiopia’s involvement in the global avocado market requires investment throughout the value chain. The sector requires functioning backward linkages to input and service agro-industries and well-organized producers including both smallholders and private investors.
According to the Central Statistical Agency’s 2021 data, about 161,470.82 hectares of land is under fruit crops out of the total cropland area under small peasant holders. Bananas contributed about 59.4 of the fruit cropland area followed by avocados that contributed 18.94 percent of the area.
More than 14,192,409.18 quintals of fruits were produced in the country. Bananas, mangoes, avocados, papayas, and oranges took up 63.30, 10.66, 17.29, 5.07 and 2.81 percent of the fruit production, respectively, it was learned.
BY GIRMACHEW GASHAW
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD WEDNESDAY 20 APRIL 2022
