CBT Gathers Tanzania’s Cashewnuts Stakeholders in Morogoro to Strategize for 2030 One Million-Tonne Production Target

Tanzania’s cashew nut stakeholders are convening in Morogoro Region to brainstorm and set a viable roadmap to meet the Government -set ambitious production target of one million tonnes by 2030.

Hosted by the Cashew Board of Tanzania (CBT), the timely forum attracts officials from the Ministry of Agriculture, regional commissioners and lawmakers from all cashew-growing regions, as well as farmers and stakeholders in the cashew crop value chain.

The meeting has been tailored to create a crucial platform for its participants to retreat, delve into, and strategize for the smooth transformation of the cashew sector in Tanzania.

However, the central focus is to improve the quality of cashews in order to ensure that Tanzania becomes the number one producer in Africa.

Currently, Tanzania is the fifth-largest producer of cashew nuts in the world and ranks second in Africa, with cashew nut exports contributing between 10 and 15 percent of the country’s foreign exchange earnings.

In his remarks to grace the meeting, Morogoro Regional Commissioner, Mr Adam Kigoma Malima, spoke about the need to increase both the production and quality of cashews.

“Let’s use this meeting to discuss in detail how to increase productivity and bring positive changes to the cashew crop. Tanzania has great potential to become the number one producer in Africa,” Mr Malima insisted.

During his presentation, the Director General of the Tanzania Cashew Board, Mr Francis Alfred, said that the Government’s direction is to increase productivity in cashew production and not the size of the production area.

He further explained that the availability of quality seeds that are resistant to pests, diseases and adverse weather conditions is very important, through the contribution of good research conducted by the Tanzania Agricultural Research Institute (TARI).

In efforts to boost production, Mr Alfred said CBT plans to distribute a total of 15 million cashew tree seedlings annually for at least five consecutive years, in an ambitious intervention aimed at bolstering the cultivation of the tropical evergreen trees in Tanzania.

A large number of the seedlings, according to him, will be distributed free of charge by the state-owned board over a period of five consecutive years.

During the last season, CBT distributed at least four million seedlings to registered farmers in the sector, against a target of two million seedlings, thereby exceeding the set distribution target by 100 percent.

The implementation of the robust programme is in response to the skyrocketing demand for seedlings among farmers engaged in cashew production in Tanzania, driven by the expansion of both local and international cashew markets.

In Tanzania, cashews are largely cultivated by smallholder farmers, who maintain an average of 2.5 acres, while currently Tanzania has a total of 549,936 registered cashew growers managing 137 million cashew trees.

The Board is currently implementing serious interventions in cooperation with the parent ministry to elevate the quality of Tanzania’s cashews, with an eye on capturing wider international markets for the valuable nuts.

“We are focusing on enabling growers to produce first- and second-class cashew nuts, with a Shelled Out-Turn (SHOT) of 44 percent and above, and not below 35 percent,” Mr Francis revealed.

To achieve this, CBT is considering organising a special training programme to impart recommended agronomic practices, on-farm management, as well as proper drying and storage of cashew nuts to farmers.

“In the global cashew market, there are two main perspectives, quality and quantity, and for the board, we are rather dealing with quality,” Mr Francis said.

Quality assurance is a key factor that has kept Tanzania at the helm of the global cashew market while enabling farmers to fetch competitive prices.

Value addition to cashews is another key area that the Board is working to attain, targeting to ensure that the country exports processed cashews to expand its market base and profits.

The Board is currently implementing a series of strategies to push for increased processing of cashews and value addition while sensitising the public on increased local consumption.

Selling cashew kernels will have a multiplier effect on the economy, whereby Tanzania will earn substantial amounts of foreign currency and contribute towards Vision 2050.

Among a series of efforts so far attained by the Board to expand the scope of cashew processing is the procurement of at least 100 modern mini-processing machines, with the capacity to process between 800 kilogrammes and 1.8 tonnes of cashew nuts in eight hours.

The facilities will support small-scale farmers’ processing groups to process their nuts professionally before reaching the markets.

The introduction of the Korosho Marathon, an annual event staged to sensitise the public on wider domestic consumption of the nuts, is another useful strategy engineered by the CBT to push for processed cashews, and its outcomes have proved successful.

For instance, from September to date, CBT has managed to export and sell processed cashews valued at US$28 million, which include processed cashew husks and oil.

However, the establishment of Maranje Industrial Park, a useful hub for the processing of nuts, is considered a vital and promising stage towards placing Tanzania at the needed cashew processing level.

The modern establishment is expected to involve a number of modern plants upon its completion, whereby the Board has already constructed two warehouses, each with a capacity to hold 10,000 tonnes.

The Ministry of Agriculture, through the Cashew Board of Tanzania, has facilitated the establishment of key infrastructure in the industrial park, starting with 354 acres out of 1,572 acres, by constructing roads and connecting electricity and water to the area.

The area has been registered with the Tanzania Investment and Special Economic Zones Authority (TISEZA) to ensure prospective investors benefit from the various tax incentives that the authority offers.

Two giant cashew processing investors have already extended their investment footholds into the area.

These include Mateak Company, which is constructing a factory with a processing capacity of 100,000 tonnes, with construction work for the facility currently at its mid-stage.

The other is the Ivory Coast-based giant cashew processing company, Dorado, which is installing a processing plant with a capacity of 150,000 tonnes, with the relevant construction expected to be finalised next year.

The Board has worked with the parent ministry to identify more regions with potential for cashew production.

Previously, cashew production was concentrated in Mtwara, Lindi, Ruvuma, Coast Region and Tanga, but currently, cashews are produced in 17 regions and 91 councils across the country.

Some of the new cashew-growing areas include Ushetu, Biharamulo, Uvinza, Uyui, Tanganyika, Majimoto, Singida, Dodoma, Morogoro, Iringa, Njombe and Kyela.

Tanzania is one of the largest cashew producers in Africa, with exports contributing between 10 and 15 percent of the country’s foreign exchange earnings. The country is the fifth-largest producer of cashew nuts in the world and ranks second in Africa.

However, further statistics show that Tanzania produces at least 20 percent of Africa’s cashew nuts, according to figures from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Tanzania is well known for its cashew nut production, with the nuts nicknamed “green gold” due to their exceptionally good taste and high return on investment.