Thousands of farmers are earning a living growing fruit and vegetables in the Niayes, a strip of fertile land running north along Senegal’s western coastline from the outskirts of the capital, Dakar. But land speculation threatens the future of this market gardening.

“This year, we shipped 100 tonnes of mangos to both domestic and overseas markets,” said Ibrahima Mbengue, president of Federation of Vegetable Growers in the Niayes (FPMN), keeping a watchful eye on young workers who are weighing dozens of baskets of mangoes.

The FPMN was established in 1994, and Mbengue says the federation now has 2,250 members who last year farmed a total of 6,000 hectares in the area, a string of lakes and seasonal wetlands – the “niayes” from which the region takes its name.

“The growers in the Niayes are making lots of money, billions (of CFA),” said Abdoulaye Barry, a Dakar-based journalist specialising in agriculture. “There are many foreigners, especially from Guinea, working in the fields there. People have built permanent houses with their income from vegetables.”

The region’s output has more than tripled in recent years, rising from 78,000 tonnes in 2009 to 261,000 tonnes in 2011, according to figures from the National Statistical Demographic Institute (ANSD) published in the state-owned newspaper “Le Soleil” in August.

The increase is one consequence of expanding the area under cultivation, which jumped 70 percent from around 5,000 hectares in 2009 to 8,700 ha in 2011, ANSD reported. The institute estimated the total income for vegetable growers at 430 million dollars. The 750,000 tonnes of fruit and vegetables produced here in 2011 accounted for more than 40 percent of the country’s total.

Onions, tomatoes and cabbage were the most important crops, together accounting for two-thirds of the volume of produce.

Despite this strong growth, Mbengue complained of a lack of technical support from the government. Year on year, he said, production increases but the farmers are not able to compete in the international market for fruit and vegetables.

“Market garden output greatly exceeds domestic demand, and the produce is perishable. Some producers sometimes sell at a loss, since they haven’t cracked the international market,” he told IPS.

Barry agreed. “Senegalese market gardeners are not in a position to compete in the international market. The value chains are not well-organised. The level of organisation of transport, packaging and marketing of produce is weak.”

“There’s often an oversupply in the domestic market, which hurts the price,” said Sidy Guèye, FPMN’s coordinator in the rural district of Sangalkam, home to many vegetable growers.

Onions, for example, are sometimes sold at knock-down prices, for 20 or 35 cents a kilo, while at other times the price can climb to as much as 80 cents a kilo on the local market, said Madiagne Dièye, a Dakar trader.

Producers harvest three or four crops each year, mostly working on family plots of up to five hectares in size, while some producers’ associations have operations covering several hundred hectares, according to Guèye.

“People are doing well here, financially. In other parts of the country, people are living precariously,” he told IPS, referring to the value of vegetable growing in Sangalkam.

“In the Niayes, 90-95 percent of growers inherited their land. Others acquired theirs thanks to the goodwill of the relevant land management authorities,” Guèye said.

Market gardening is so important to the Senegalese economy that the government has integrated it into its wider accelerated growth strategy for agriculture and agro-industries, a multi-year plan being implemented by the government and the private sector.

But lying so close to the Senegalese capital, the Niayes region has been the object of intense land speculation. “The big men are buying land from producers, without using it,” said Woré Gana Seck, from the NGO Green Senegal, which works on agriculture. Advocacy against this form of land-grabbing must be maintained, she told IPS.

Barry thinks that the government should reserve the Niayes exclusively for market gardeners, and designate other space in areas less suited to vegetable cultivation for residential development.

Roving traders earn a small profit peddling mangoes in Karachi. Credit: Fahim Siddiqi/IPS

By Zofeen Ebrahim
KARACHI, Jun 14 2012 (IPS)

In the summer heat, fresh mangos are the fruit of choice for politicians seeking to exchange favours with foreign dignitaries. But when it comes to global trade, the prospects of the so-called king of fruit are limited.

Pakistan produced an impressive 1.7 million tonnes of mangoes last year, making it the third largest producer. But only 130,000 tonnes reached foreign markets.

While experts believe Pakistan could export 35 to 40 percent of its total produce, horticulture has never been high on the government’s agenda and little support is offered to farmers.

Braving the elements

Among Farid Khan Khakwani’s greatest fears are the earth, wind, water and the cold.

Responsible for 200 acres of land in Shujabad in the Punjab, a region recognised globally for the quality and wide variety of its mangos, his life depends on the smooth transition of the seasons.

From the time his trees start flowering in February up until August when harvesting is complete, he can ill afford drastic changes in the weather.

While he has every reason to be optimistic this time of year, he is careful to add, “Till the fruit is picked from the trees, one is never too sure.

“Last year I thought I had a bumper crop and just a week before the fruit was to be harvested, strong winds blew and both the ripe and unripe fruit fell from the trees. From two million mangoes I was left with less than 800,000 of marketable fruit,” Khakwani told IPS.

Wildly fluctuating temperatures, changed rainfall patterns and inexplicably strong winds are taking farmers by surprise and taking their toll on the mango.

Experts say the crop yield will be 25 to 30 percent less this year. Many blame the adverse weather conditions.

“There was an unusually extended winter and during late February 2012 we experienced frostbite. That is the time when the buds begin to blossom,” said Khakwani, who inherited the 40-year-old farm from his father some 13 years ago.

But researchers say it is not fair to blame the weather for the low yield or the dismal score on exports.

Supporting Farmers

Realising the potential in the sector, the U.S. government has pledged to strengthen mango harvesting and exports overseas.

The focus is on “creating market linkages, developing on-farm infrastructure, assisting farmers to achieve international certifications, providing trainings on pre and post-harvest practices and working in mango value addition,” said Dr. Waqar Ahmed, horticulture advisor and expert in mango cultivation.

Ahmed has worked with 29 farms since 2009 on the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Firms Project.

Over the course of the project, 4,500 farmers and exporters have received training and 14 mango farms have been set up with modern processing and storage facilities.

The project has also helped mango growers to ship their produce to new export markets in Europe and the Middle East.

“This year we are assisting farmers in achieving Global Good Agricultural Practices (GAP) certification, for exports, as required by the European Union and the U.S. markets,” said Haroon Shuaib, who heads the Firms communication team.

Ghulam Sarwar Abro, a farmer in Kotri in Sindh Province, has learned many new things from the training. In three years he has received global certification and is set to export his mangos to Europe.

“We never kept pace with the modern methods of farming. I did not know I could spray micronutrients onto the trees to provide the tree nutrition; instead I used fertiliser in the soil,” he said.

But pruning was the first task Abro undertook after meeting USAID experts.

“We were proud of the height our mango trees would attain, not realising it was only going to give less yield. We never realised old giants need more nutrition and still remain hungry,” he told IPS.

New knowledge helped save his mangos, as strong winds swept the fruit from his trees, “Because mine were already at a lower height and thin, wind could pass through easily and my fruit was unharmed.”

Government shortcomings

Failure to adhere to basic plant health requirements and the subsequent trade barriers leave little incentive for exporters, according to Ahmed.

The Pakistan National Accreditation Council and the Department of Plant Protection responsible for these regulations are resource-stretched.

“So much time, effort and money is spent holding seminars and mango galas, if half of it was put in promoting market linkages and collaborative trade through Pakistan trade attaches abroad, it would pay dividends,” insists Ahmed.

But it is the poor farmer who has least to gain in the faulty agricultural marketing system.

The risk-aversion policy adopted by farmers due to the weather compels them to sell their mangos at low rates, whilst traders sell the fruit in local markets for nearly four times the price.

“The difference goes into the pocket of the trader alone. Being a perishable commodity, the middlemen exploit these farmers,” Ahmad said.

While the government subsidises fertilisers and agrochemicals for manufacturers, subsidies are not provided to farmers despite the cost of production having increased manifold.

“There are four Research and Development departments, two each in Sindh and Punjab, the main mango-growing areas.” Ahmed told IPS.

Every agricultural university across Pakistan has a horticulture department fitted with state of the art laboratories and libraries continuously conducting research into cash crops.

“But the transfer of knowledge to the farmer is negligible,” Ahmed said.

New research remains on the library shelves of these institutions and makes little difference to the farmers.