The maiden shipment, comprising 24 metric tonnes of the Hass avocado variety, valued at 18,500 US dollars, departed by sea on October 28, 2024 and arrived at Hong Kong Port on Monday.
The milestone marks a successful collaboration between a Tanzania pioneer avocado company and member of Tanzania Horticultural Association (TAHA), Africado Ltd, Westfalia South Africa and Chinese Mr Avocado.
According to Africado’s Certification Manager, Mr Festus Nkuru, the container passed Chinese customs inspections smoothly, a key milestone that Tanzanian exporters believe heralds a major commercial success for the industry.
“As we speak our container loaded with Tanzanian avocados arrived at Mr Avocado’s South China Ripening and Distribution Centre and the butter fruits are set to be distributed across retail supermarkets paving the way for future exports” Mr Nkuru explained.
The successful arrival of the shipment represents the culmination of six years of painstaking and strategic efforts to penetrate the Chinese market by the government, TAHA and others.
“As we celebrate our first shipment of avocados to China, we are thrilled to mark this significant milestone for our company and Tanzania’s avocado industry,” said Mr Nkuru, highlighting the growth potential this market holds for local producers. Africado Ltd, based in the Siha District, Kilimanjaro Region, targets to meet the growing demand for high-quality Tanzanian avocados in China.
This will contribute to its broader goals of international expansion and tapping into the rising global appetite for the premium butter fruit. Africado acknowledged the central role of the government, the Ministry of Agriculture, Tanzania Plant Health and Pesticides Authority (TPHPA), TAHA and international partners like the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), whose collaborative efforts facilitated the opening of this lucrative new export market.
Mr Nkuru said that the breakthrough not only boosts Africado’s position as a leading exporter, but also provides significant economic opportunities for local growers, promising higher returns and supporting Tanzania’s broader economic growth.
“As Tanzania’s largest grower and pioneer in the avocado industry, Africado Ltd, is optimistic about the economic multipliers effects of this development on both the company and the country’s agricultural sector” he explained.
Tanzania and China signed a protocol on sanitary and phytosanitary (PSP) requirements during President Samia Suluhu Hassan’s maiden state visit to China, where she engaged her Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, to allow the Tanzanian grown avocados to access its sprawling market for the ‘butter fruit’.
China’s soaring appetite for avocados, driven by demand from its burgeoning health-conscious middleclass, has made the “butter fruit” — unheard of a few years ago — the country’s star performer in the imported fruit market.
Overwhelmed by the update, the multi-milliondollar horticultural industry champion and TAHA CEO, Dr Jacqueline Mkindi, said the China’s gesture would herald fortunes to local farmers, exporters and bolster bilateral trade ties between the two countries.
Dr Mkindi is grateful indeed to the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Hussein Bashe, who, she said, worked extremely hard, courting the Tanzania’s Embassy in China to ensure the local companies are audited to comply and eventually get sanitary and phytosanitary clearance.
The TAHA CEO also attributes China’s move to grant market access for Tanzanian avocados to Beijing’s elaborate plan to increase imports from Africa, as part of a trade rebalance aimed at cutting deficits between Beijing and the natural-resource-rich continent.
With a population of over 1.4 billion, China — which is the 10th leading importer of avocado globally — is now likely to become Tanzania’s next leading destination for fresh avocados that have traditionally been restricted to Europe and the Middle East.
Despite being the third largest avocado producer in Africa after South Africa and Kenya, Tanzanian farmers have largely failed to access the export market for their produce, owing to lack of SPS measures for the butter fruit to access as is the case now with the Sino market.
“I’m so thankful and proud of our President, Dr Samia, for her finest diplomatic traits that saw the lucrative avocado market of the 1.4 billion population nation opened after six years of our own struggles,” Dr Mkindi said.
Daily News
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