TOMATO VALUE CHAIN

Introduction
• Tomato value chain has potentials for food security, income,
and employment generations for millions of people in
Nigeria
• Nigeria is currently the largest producer of fresh tomato in
sub-Saharan Africa, the second largest producer  in Africa,
(producing 10.8% of fresh tomatoes in the region) and the
14th largest producer in the world
• Over the last decade, the production of
fresh tomatoes in Nigeria has grown by 25% from 1.8 million
tonnes to an estimated 2.3 million tonnes
Introduction cont’d
•Northwest geopolitical zone is the leading
producer, while Jigawa is the leading
producing state
•Sadly, 40% of this suffer post harvest losses
due to lack of knowledge of value chain
•There are opportunities for both export and
expanding local market
Actors in tomato value chain and activities
Tomato value chain in the country is short and fairly
complex
There are four main actors in tomato value chain
The actors are: Farmers, fresh tomato marketers,
processors, and processed tomato marketers
Farmers

• Tomato production in Nigeria is mainly done by

smallholders who rely on rains for production (rain-fed
farming)
• Farmers buy/rent land, get inputs (tomato seeds,
fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides, farm tools, credits, etc,)
from suppliers
• They plant the seeds and nurture for between 2-3
months (depending on the variety)
• Sell fresh mature tomato fruits to consumers/fresh
tomato marketers/processors
 Fresh tomato marketers
• They buy fresh mature tomato fruits from farmers and
sell to consumers/processors
Processors
•They buy fresh tomato fruits from
farmers/marketers as well as other inputs
(processing facilities) from their suppliers and
transform the fruits to tomato pastes
•They in turn sell to tomato paste
marketers/consumers
Tomato paste marketers

• Marketers buy processed tomato (tomato pastes)

and sell to consumers
Other actors are:
• Universities/research institutes,
• Agro-input dealers,
• Government and
• Financial institutions
Value added
• Value added = Amount received by an actor-amount
paid by the actor
Tomato value chain map

Consumers
Fresh tomato
marketers

Input suppliers
Farmers

Processors
Research Institutes

Policy
makers
Financial service Marketers of processed
providers tomato
Constraints at the production node
• Lack of credit facilities
• Limited availability & accessibility to high yielding and resistant
varieties
• Pests and diseases contributing to low production and productivity
• Lack of reliable and established markets e.g non-establishment of
contract farming
• Limited extension & research resulting in post-harvest losses
• Poor organized functional farming associations
• Lack of implementation of some policy documents
• Theft
Constraints at fresh tomato marketing node
• Lack of credit facilities
• Poor infrastructure e.g road network and electricity
• Seasonality in supply of fresh tomato fruits
• High market levies
• Fruits are highly perishable
Constraints at the processing node
• High cost of processing technologies and non availability of
locally produced processing and storage technologies
• Lack of credit facilities
• Poor infrastructure e.g road network, water supply and
electricity
• Lack of training
• Seasonality in supply of raw materials
• Lack of quality standards for fresh fruits