RESEARCH ON INDIGENOUS FRUITS VITAL FOR JOB CREATION
MORE research on indigenous fruits and natural products needs to be conducted in order to promote their growth and contribute to sustainable job creation.
This is according to Prospero Zambia Manager Natural Artisanal Initiative, Likimbi Kapihya, who observed that limited research and development in indigenous fruits and natural products was hindering the sector’s growth and potential to contribute to job creation.
Presently, there are a growing number of actors deriving value from natural inputs and ingredients in the country.
Some of the indigenous fruits are Ngai, mabuyu, masau and masuku, among others.
While they are all addressing a market need for products derived from biodiversity, Ms Kapihya indicated that the development of the sector was still fragmented.
She cited the sourcing of inputs as being disorganised, and production capacity and quality was also not consistent.
Ms Kapihya said this during the Indigenous Fruits and Natural products workshop recently.
She said this was hindering the development of the entire sector, stating that some of the issues affecting the sector are limited sector specific information.
“Access to market, finance and no sector specific support are some of the issues affecting its development. All this lead to fragmented growth of the sector and limits growth of individual businesses,” Ms Kapihya said.
She said the organisation had organised a consortium where it intends to connect all actors along the value chain, integrate communities where natural products are sourced in a way that enables them to access capacity building, financial and business development services.
Ms Kapihya said the consortium provides a way to co-create industry standards, develop industry advocacy and marketing campaigns, and lobby for regulatory reforms.
The objective of the group was to establish a competitive, well integrated sub-sector of natural ingredients producers and processors that participate in local, regional and international markets.