Banana/plantain Processing: Tap-flow Of Jobs, Income

The country is already halfway into the targeted production tonnage since 2020.  The income flow from developing the banana/plantain sector would be everyone’s guess and the effects should count fabulous openings for jobs and businesses. A ready market for higher production levels is being explored on corridors like Turkey, Nigeria, South Africa and many other African countries.
Cameroon’s Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Gabriel Mbairobe, representing the highest authority of the land, oversaw the signing of multiple agreements on 1st December, 2023 by actors to boost the banana/plantain sector. The agreements were engaged as the actors rounded off this year’s second international festival of the banana/plantain crop in Limbe, Fako Division of the South West Region. The move taken would facilitate the crop’s large-scale financing, production, exportation, marketing and technical cooperation.
To maximize these economic opportunities, a movement of festivals to underscore the importance of banana/plantain was in its second edition involving actors from Cameroon and neighbouring Nigeria. Minister Gabriel Mbairobe chaired a thrilling banana/plantain festival at the end of which he promised the erection of two banana/plantain processing plants in Kupe Muanenguba Division still in the South West Region in no distant future. The processing units will add value to the qualitative and quantitative plantains produced in the area.
The outcome of the second banana/plantain festival was predicated on agreements to enable agricultural and business students from the Universities of Buea and Douala to take up abounding opportunities revolving around the crop. Authorities of the Port Authority of Douala and administrative channels like the Customs and Transport in the coastal areas of Douala and Limbe have equally indicated their desire to lend a hand for such gigantic economic ventures. This is because of the economic gains from the highly-cherished crop.
Banana/plantain production and processing can indeed present significant opportunities for job creation and large-scale income generation. The crop is widely cultivated in many regions of Cameroon notably in the fertile coastal and volcanic soils where even rudimentary yields are already noticeably high. The crop enjoys a flooding demand in local and international markets. Up till now, it has remained a fruit harvested directly from the farm to the pot and on the table in many parts of the country. This has limited the plantain’s potential as a veritable economic and job creating crop. But with the new determination, the banana/plantain revolution is on course in Cameroon.    
The just-ended event in Limbe is timely and raises hopes for the creation of local processing units for banana/plantain. Its production requires a range of activities, including cultivation, harvesting, packing, transportation, and processing. Experts of the sector indicate that these activities create employment opportunities across various stages of the value chain. Large-scale plantations can provide jobs for farm workers, while processing facilities require skilled labour for sorting, packaging, quality control, preservation and distribution.
The choice of Bangem, headquarters of Kupe Muanenguba Division in the South West Region, to erect plantain processing plants is salutary as it will absorb the idle hands of the numerous unemployed youth. The move will also protect the crop from waste and add value to it while multiplying gains over the fruit that hitherto was uni-directional in consumption. Bangem is also noted for high yields of plantain but has until now suffered a cruel lack of roads to evacuate the produce from farm to market or from production to consumption.   
Plantain crops can be highly profitable, especially when produced and marketed effectively. A successful processing venture can generate substantial income for farmers, processors, and distributors. Additionally, experts in the sector say the by-products of processing banana/plantain, from root to fruit, can bring about plantain flour, chips, dried slices, wine, liquor, paper pulp, textile, charcoals and more. It so creates additional revenue streams. In that way plantain becomes a high level income generating economic crop requiring many hands on deck.
Considering just the by-product of plantain flour, it may be noteworthy to recall as largely reported in tabloids that Cameroon imported 860,000 tons of wheat flour in 2020 spending about FCFA 150 billion. Also eye opening is the researchers’ fact that averagely, each Cameroonian consumes a minimum of 33 kilogrammes of flour yearly upon which constant the Agriculture Ministry is envisaging a must 30 per cent local production. Advancement in the sector would also mean improving produc...