A new study shows that a majority of the avocado traders in Tanzania finds the avocado business satisfying, while the majority of the avocado farmers finds it dissatisfying.
PhD student Ibrahim Juma at the Department of Plant Breeding recently published an article on the avocado productions in Tanzania. The study is a part of a larger Tanzanian avocado research program under the bilateral research capacity building programme financed by the Swedish International Development Coorporation Agency (Sida).
The paper describes the avocado growers and their firms in the southern highlands of Tanzania, the yield, economic gains and the challenges faced by the growers. The study also covers the avocado local trade, characteristics of the traders, marketing places, and challenges faced by the traders.
The major findings of the study where:
- Both local and commercial avocados were grown in Tanzania by smallholder farmers, majority of them being males, who dominated the avocado production. They practised both mono-cropping and inter-cropping farming systems.
- The local avocados were sold only in local markets while the commercial avocados were sold in both local markets and to the exporting companies. Due to unreliable market environments and the short shelf life of avocado fruits especially the local varieties, both avocado types were sold at relatively low prices which did not reflect the production hustles of the farmers. About two-thirds of the farmers were dissatisfied with the avocado trade.
- A number of challenges faced by the avocado growers were unveiled and their effects on crop yield and value chain were discussed.
- Majority of avocado traders were females with lower capital compared to their male counterparts. More than two-thirds of the traders were satisfied with the avocado trade.
- The challenges faced by the avocado traders were unveiled and their effects to the avocado value chain were discussed.
This is the first paper in the avocado research program with the objectives to study the avocado production and local trade in Tanzania, to document the morphological characteristics of Tanzanian avocado germplasm and to establish its genetic diversity using microsatellite DNA markers.
"The second paper which will give details about the morphological characteristics of Tanzanian avocado germplasm will hopefully be published before March 2020", says Ibrahim Juma.
