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From a small cashew processing country, Côte d’Ivoire has managed to become in a few years the third supplier of cashew kernels (that is, shelled nuts) on the international market.
This is the culmination of a fight that began a few years ago: that of the world’s leading producer of cashews, tired of seeing its harvest leave for Asia to be processed and re-exported. Tired especially of losing 20 to 25% of added value on his product.
Because selling shelled nuts earns between $1,000 and $1,500 more per ton, says Pierre Ricau, chief analyst of the N’Kalo agricultural market information service. And above all, industry creates jobs. 70,000 tons of processed fruit is work for regarding 7,000 Ivorians, because automating the process still requires a lot of manpower. Another advantage, a shelled walnut is a product easier to store, and less perishable than a raw walnut.
Côte d’Ivoire therefore had all the right reasons to encourage private investors to take an interest in the sector. At the same time, it has taken a series of drastic measures to offer the market a shelled nut that is competitive with that of the champion in the field: Vietnam.
Incentives for massive transformation
Thus, from 2017, shipments of Ivorian almonds were encouraged and subsidized, and those of raw nuts, on the contrary, hit with a tax of 100 CFA francs per kilo. Today’s results are the realization of this offensive policy: the transformation rate has more than doubled in a year.
In turn, exports jumped, giving Ivory Coast the status of the third exporter instead of Brazil. With a panel of new buyers, since 32 countries ordered Ivorian cashew almonds last year.
Côte d’Ivoire has benefited from a particular advantage related to the pandemic: the disorganization of sea freight has made deliveries of shelled nuts from Vietnam more expensive and more uncertain.
