₦airaland Forum

IMPACTS OF RAINING SEASON ON VOLUME PRODUCTIVITY AND PRICES OF CASSAVA PRODUCTS

At the beginning of a new raining season, matured cassava on the farm begin to bring out new leaves and all will become very greenish unlike the appearance in December and January. This is an indication that the underneath tubers are absorbing moisture rapidly and are able to rapidly transfer some of their stored nutrients unto other parts of the plants – specifically stems and leaves.

The underneath tubers may become bigger in sizes due to moisture absorbed, the real body contents of the tubers; starch and fibre, will begin to reduce in quantity. Making cassava tubers procured for production during this time tend to give lower yield. Same quantity of tuber that produced 10 bags of garri during the dry season will hardly produce 8 bags during this time. Same way one will hardly get 45 tempo-pack (33kg) of wet fufu from a pick-load (2.7 tons) that yielded 55 bags in December.

Sometimes, this also affect the quality attributes of the finished products. The physical appearance (colour) of garri and fufu produced from tubers harvested at this time tend to be more cream-like or even turning slightly brownish instead of the generally desired whitish colour. And the low starch content makes the plasticity (draw-ness) of the fufu to significantly reduce when cooked.

The usual abundant availability of cassava tubers around this time due to heavy harvesting – as soil become softened and farmers need to replant their farms, causes the market price to drop significantly. This scenario is again expected this year as many farmers are already seeking buyers; though the drop might not be much like it used to be. This envisaged drop in price of cassava tubers is expected to slightly make up for output volume reduction of the finished products, but not really significantly. Thus, the drop in price of the finished products around this time may not be that significant.

Processors of stable products like garri often take advantage of lower price of tubers during this period to mass produce, and then store for onward sales when the price become higher, as cassava harvest reduces across farm areas.

This is among the critical dynamics to watch out for in cassava business and possibly explored, in timing of processing and operational areas.

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God no go shame us.

Kazeem Lamidi
+2348100975775