THE RISING PRICE OF TOMATOES – IT’S THE GOLD SEASON

Fresh ripe tomatoes

“Nigeria is one of the largest consumer of tomato in the world” that has been said by various analyst world over. I don’t need an analyst to tell me that because I know that in Nigeria we eat just about everything with tomato. All our stews, soups and sauces in every corner of Nigeria includes tomato.

 We use tomatoes for salads, to fry omelettes, sandwiches and various other dishes. If you are like my husband or my father, you also eat tomato raw (yuk) like you eat an apple or any fruit.

Tomatoes can be cultivated anywhere across Nigeria, and this is because our tropical condition is favourable to the survival of tomatoes. There are many varieties of tomato but the greater part of tomato production in Nigeria is undertaken in the North of the country. Kaduna, Kano, Jigawa, Katsina, Sokoto, Plateau and Bauchi states. Although the Southern states also grow commercial quantity the variety grown is not as dry or large as that of the North.

Tomatoes as sold in Mile 12 Market, Lagos

In Lagos, most of our tomatoes and other fresh farm produce are supplied by the North. All the items are transported by road in cane baskets stacked on each other, by the time the produce gets to the market half of it is rotten.

From the farm an average basket can cost about N300 by the time it gets to Mile 12 market it can sell from about N3000 to N20,000 depending on the season and that includes the rotten, ungraded pieces.

Early this year, a basket of tomato in Lagos was sold for about N3,000; today in July we bought the same basket for N15,000. Last week it was N20,000.

There are two major reasons for the increase in price, 1. The season, 2. The unrest in the North.

Regardless of these reasons, we need to find a way to preserve our tomatoes. It is ridiculous to buy a basket of tomato about 40kg for N3000 then 6 months later that same tomato is sold for N20,000. When I know that two thirds of the tomatoes from the farm go to waste because of poor standards of harvesting, storage, transportation and preservation.

Nigeria produces 1.5 million tons of tomatoes annually of which about 900,000 tons rot, Agriculture Minister Akinwunmi Adesina said at a June 13 presentation in the capital, Abuja in 2013.

Nigeria is one of the biggest importers of tomato paste. We import tomato paste from Europe, Canada and China. Yet our own tomato belt is filled with rotten tomatoes. Ludicrous!

Imported Canned Tomatoes - Soon to be produced in Nigeria

In 2013, the Central Bank and Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, teamed up to establish a $25 million tomato-paste factory in Kano. The intervention by the Central Bank of Nigeria, which commissioned a study to show that processing local tomatoes is cheaper than importing paste from China, is part of the government’s drive to cut annual food imports of more than $10 billion. 

I am happy with this huge investment in tomato preservation in Nigeria but my worry is if the factory will cater to local consumption or exports. The factory has a capacity of about 400,000 tonnes of tomato-paste annually for a market demand of 900,000 tonnes annually.

In another news, I read that Thomas Canning of Maidstone, Ontario Canada, has signed a $25-million tomato product deal with a Nigerian company, Festrut Group. The tomatoes will be grown in Leamington, Ontario, the tomato capital of Canada, and canned in nearby Maidstone, before being shipped overseas to Nigeria. 

So as one rich man is helping local farmers preserve, maximize their profit and also feed Nigerians, another rich man is spending the same amount of money to help foreign farmers, save their jobs and feed Nigerians in the process. ummm Issokay… 

I’m in support of preserving local produce and drastically reducing price of local fresh farm produce in the market place. At a period like this when the price of tomato is like that of gold, my retail customers prefer imported canned whole tomatoes. The wholesale customers like Hotels, Restaurants and Eateries have no choice but to buy the fresh tomatoes but this drastically cuts into their profit as they can’t be expected to change their selling prices seasonally.

Diced Bottled Tomatoes - Another form of preservation

It is very sad because I know that if Nigerians can preserve the tomatoes during the season when it is cheap either canned whole or paste we would drop our domestic consumption price by more than half and that applies to many of our fresh foods especially during off season. This will also reduce our dependence on imports. We can do this successfully without resulting in banning. (I do not like banning of any sort, I’d rather we improve our local practices to meet up with our foreign competitors).

Investing in various fresh food preservation methods is a good way to help everyone save money; it is also a good way to help our local farmers maximize their profit and reduce their farm waste. In a country where the poor are over 70% of the population this has to be number one on any transformation agenda.