Economy: A lode of cashew nuts
Growing in desert areas, the cultivation of the cashew nut has a strong potential in terms of economic growth. A typical case illustrating this view is that of Cote d’Ivoire. Being the first African producer of cocoa and coffee, Cote d’Ivoire equally blazed the trail of cashew nuts and today the country has a basket full of 7000 tons of the said product. In a bid to diversify the range of its agricultural products, Cameroon has embarked on producing the commodity. «The growth potential of the cashew nut incites us to develop a national cashew nut development strategy», the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Henri EYEBE AYISSI, said during a restitution workshop of the study on the cashew nut held on 9 October 2017 in Yaounde.
This increasing interest in cultivation definitely is what took him to Cote d’Ivoire from 24 - 29 of last September. The mission had two goals: understand the strategies for the sustainable development of cocoa and coffee and especially of the cashew-tree (anacardium) in order to implement it in Cameroon where it is under-exploited. According to the support mission for the competitive cashew initiative that visited Cameroon from 24 September to 10 October 2017 with the assistance of GIZ, the country has only an annual production of 108 tons of cashew nuts in the North and South Regions, despite a potential estimated at about a million hectares.
From discussions with various Ivorian authorities, MINADER and the delegation that accompanied it learnt that the surge in the cashew nut commodity is due to the setting of the least price which protects the producer from world market price fluctuations. The said visit led to a project of cooperation between Cameroon and Cote d’Ivoire aimed at introducing the “Mercedes Cocoa” species capable of producing about three tons in a hectare in three months. Another source of assistance in the cashew nut venture that the country is seeking is German cooperation: « We are going to provide Cameroon with our technical expertise and support trade among various actors», promised Dr Petra Wagner, Resident Director of the regional office of GIZ in Yaounde during the workshop of 9 last October. The organisation has thus proposed to accompany the development of the cashew commodity by a co-funding scheme from the 11th European Development Fund (EDF) / Africa Caribbean-Pacific Secretariat.
(Source Cameroon Tribune N° 11453/7652 du 17 octobre 2017)