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Other key interventions provided by Government and various stakeholders in the industry
included:
• Government-funded road construction to help producers move their farm produce
• Development and distribution of new pineapple varieties
• Provision of training (capacity-building) and financial support to smallholder farmers
• Assistance to smallholder producers with the supply of production inputs
• Purchase of produce from farmers and processing for local consumption and export.
Achievements. By 2002, Ghana had made its first commercial exports of the MD2 pineapple
variety. However, by 2006 42,000 tonnes of the commodity were exported earning the country
20 million US dollars. Consequently the country regained its position as the world’s third largest
exporter of pineapples to European markets, with the MD2 variety, having overtaken the oncedominant
smooth Cayenne variety, accounting for about 85 percent of all pineapple exports
to that market.
Pineapples now account for more than 50 percent of Ghana’s total horticultural exports and
the crop is a source of income and employment for 15,000 people. Increased production has
led to significant poverty reduction in pineapple-growing areas with farmers reporting a 10
percent increase in income (World Bank, 2006), largely due to increased production and higher
prices for the commodity.
Many smallholder farmers in southern Ghana have joined the pineapple business in the last
decade, growing this crop for both export and local markets. Many small-scale producers sell
for both fresh local consumption and for export. A large-scale processor is the Blue Skies fruitprocessing
company located on the outskirts of Accra. Income from pineapple sales has made a
significant contribution to family income and living standards, while food security from cassava
and maize has been maintained. Pineapple production has also benefitted women and young
people. Women producing pineapples have become more economically independent and
some young people have abandoned low-paid jobs in the towns to take up pineapple farming
as a profitable venture.
Research. Although there is little research undertaken in the pineapple industry at farm level,
major processors undertake research on quality assurance of the processed product in order
to meet the standards required by the European market.
New or unresolved challenges. Ongoing challenges include rising input costs, price volatility
and a lack of irrigation facilities. At the same time increasing land consolidation has meant that
benefits are being increasingly concentrated in the hands of larger producers, as smallholder
producers are increasingly unable to compete. As the smooth Cayenne variety is progressively
squeezed out of the market by the newly introduced and favoured MD2 variety, this poses a
serious threat to smallholder growers, who account for some 50 percent of production volumes
(Larsen et al., 2006).
The case studies: West Africa 69