Tomato and pepper market segments identified for eastern and western Africa

Tomato and pepper are very important cash crops for many tens of thousands of farmers across Africa, and for decades the World Vegetable Center has supported seed companies and national agricultural research and extension systems with improved breeding lines and varieties. But to better guide investments in plant breeding and seed system development, reliable evidence on the needs of farmers, processors and consumers is essential to prioritize market segments.

[Note: a market segment is a group of producers with common variety requirements, who are driven by processor and consumer needs combined with where and how the crop is grown.]

To meet this need, a preliminary set of seed product market segments for tomato and pepper in eastern and western Africa provided a basis for discussion during validation workshops including private and public sector stakeholders, as part of a partnership between the World Vegetable Center and the CGIAR Initiative on Market Intelligence. These efforts will eventually incorporate tomato and pepper into the Seed Product Market Segment (SPSM) database hosted in the Global Market Intelligence Platform (GloMIP). In total, the workshops identified 16 fresh tomato and 14 pepper market segments, differentiated by region and other factors.

The two workshops in Tanzania and Benin in March 2024, each with more than 30 participants from a total of 13 countries, provided a platform for engagement through group work and plenary sessions. The CGIAR Market Intelligence team provided theoretical foundations for market segmentation, while the WorldVeg team presented their findings on different market segments. This collaborative approach gathered diverse perspectives and insights, enriching the discourse, knowledge exchange on tomato and pepper cultivation, trait preferences and market dynamics that will ultimately facilitate the work of breeders and enhance agricultural practices across eastern and western Africa.

Some interesting findings included, for tomato, the predominance of fresh market, oblong, open-pollinated, determinate varieties adapted for cultivation in open fields in lowland western Africa. Thus, a specific disease package for lowland-adapted varieties is needed, and participants also raised the importance of including salinity tolerance in the WorldVeg tomato breeding program. In eastern Africa however, tomato is mainly grown in highlands, with a need for resistance to certain pests and diseases such as South American leaf miner, and tomato spotted wilt virus against which WorldVeg has already developed a resistant breeding line.

For pepper, habaneros were confirmed as most important in western Africa with different color preferences noted, but that chili peppers are also important and grown widely. The smaller sweet pepper market includes green peppers primarily for local consumption, and colored peppers often for hotels and tourists. In eastern Africa, long chilies are preferred over habaneros, and while sweet pepper segmentation was the same as in western Africa, the total acreage planted was much higher. There were also some national specificities identified, such as the Ethiopian market being dominated by the milder Berbere chili, and the particularly hot bird’s eye pepper important in Rwanda.

Market intelligence workshop participants, Cotonou, Benin, and Arusha, Tanzania, March 2024

Text adapted and summarized from:

Tomato market segments in Western and Eastern Africa – CGIAR

By Mwasilwa Ambali, Mathieu Ayenan, Assaf Eybishitz (World Vegetable Center)

and

Pepper market segment validation workshops in Benin and Tanzania – CGIAR

By Derek Barchenger, Herbaud Zohoungbogbo, Mwasilwa Ambali (World Vegetable Center)

In: Market Intelligence Bulletin, Volume 2, 2024 (Published on 27.06.24)

Market Intelligence Bulletin, Volume 2, 2024 (mailchi.mp)

The CGIAR Initiative on Market Intelligence provides data, analysis and insights to understand, connect, and align the two different views of crop breeding: the business view, the opportunity to be realized from providing improved products, and the biological view, the ability of crop breeding to develop the improved products.