september-2018

50 / BUSINESS / Avocados
BUSINESS / 51
FAT OF
THE LAND
IN THE HIGHLANDS just north
of Nairobi, near the industrial town of
Thika, a green revolution is taking place.
A seedlings propagation farm has started
nursing some 100,000 baby trees per
year into adulthood. These trees will all
bear a fruit for which an increasingly
health-aware world is becoming evermore
hungry: the avocado. According to The
New York Times, in 1994 the average
American consumed around 500 g of
avocados per year. Today, that number is
over 3 kg. And typing “#avocado” on
Instagram yields over eight million results.
The soaring worldwide demand for
avocado is perhaps not surprising, considering
that the fruit has proven to be a
nutritional superstar. Two-thirds of it
consists of monounsaturated fats, which
are associated with an improved cholesterol
level, a lower risk of cardiovascular
disease and better insulin and blood
sugar control. Furthermore, avocados
contain some 20 essential nutrients,
including fibres, vitamins C, E, K, B,
folic acid and potassium. Add to that
the fact that the fruit just tastes delicious,
and is considered a great meat
substitute in sandwiches and salads, and
one starts to understand why avocado
has become so popular.
of thousands of farmers across Kenya
have planted avocados,” says Kariuki
Gaita, cofounder and head of exports
for Selina Wamucii, an agriculture firm
that sources and distributes fresh fruit
and vegetables. In total, Gaita estimates,
some 160,000 Kenyan farmers now grow
avocados, making the avocado the
fourth-most-important national fruit
crop behind bananas, mangos and
pineapples.
Smallholder farmers are responsible
for 75 percent of Kenyan production, and
Selina Wamucii currently works with over
3,000 of them. “We expect this number to
quadruple once we open up our farmer
enrolment again,” adds Gaita.
But even with avocado farms mushrooming
throughout Kenya, the sector
can’t keep up with international demand.
Late last year, Kenya’s Directorate of
Horticulture temporarily banned all
avocado exports. “We have stopped the
export of Fuerte and Hass varieties
because traders would ship out immature
crop because of high demand in the
world market,” Agriculture and Food
Authority chief Alfred Busolo told
Business Daily Africa at the time. Luckily,
the export stop was relatively short-lived.
The ban on Fuerte (leathery green skin)
avocados was lifted on 1 February, while
the ban on Hass (bumpy dark green/
purple skin) avocados was lifted a
month later. >
“China imported just 2 tonnes of avocados in
2010, but by last year that figure had risen to
more than 32,000 tonnes”
Alamy
Kenya is famous for exporting world-class
coffee, tea and flowers across the globe, but
THE AVOCADO – a so-called superfood –
may soon become cream of the crop.
text Nils Elzenga
Stocksy
A BED OF ROSES
Soloplant Kenya Ltd, the Kenyan
company behind the avocado seedlings
propagation farm, has been engaged for
over 20 years in a better-known agricultural
success story: roses. Based on this
experience, General Manager Anna
Nosareva predicts a similarly bright
future for Kenyan avocados. “The sector
definitely has a good chance of repeating
the earlier success stories of flowers, tea
and coffee,” she says. Indeed, Soloplant
can barely keep up with the seedlings
demand from the swathe of avocado
plantations that are springing up all over
Kenya. Nosareva is considering scaling
up, considerably.
The amount of land that is dedicated
to growing avocados is increasing every
day. “In the last three years alone, tens
What’s in a name?
Avocados are believed to have originated in the south of what is today Mexico, which is still the
world’s largest avocado producer. Avocados are classified as large berries, and they have been
cultivated since antiquity. Their name derives from the Nahua – the original inhabitants of southern
Mexico – who called the fruit āhuacatl, which also means testicle.