Last Israeli farmers leave enclave after Jordan deal ends

Yahoo –AFP, April 30, 2020

Israeli farmers will no longer be allowed to enter an agricultural enclave in
neighbouring Jordan, following the expiry of Israel’s lease on the border land
(AFP Photo/MENAHEM KAHANA)

Tsofar (Israel) (AFP) - Israeli farmers left an agricultural enclave in neighbouring Jordan possibly for the last time Thursday, as the extension of a lease enabling their use of the border land expired.

Ghumar, known as Tsofar in Hebrew, is a Jordanian territory south of the Dead Sea that was occupied by Israel during the Six Day War of 1967.

Under the 1994 peace deal, Jordan retained sovereignty over the area, along with another territory called Baqura, seized when Israeli forces infiltrated Jordan in 1950.

As part of the 1994 agreement, Jordan agreed to lease both places to Israel for a renewable 25 years, with a one-year notice period for either party.

The lease expired in November after Jordan's King Abdullah II notified Israel that it wanted to take back the two areas.

His decision came as the country suffers high unemployment, inflation and poverty, exacerbated by the presence of hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing the war in neighbouring Syria.

Despite the peace agreement, relations with Israel have been tense in recent years.

Baqura, or Naharayim in Hebrew, was reclaimed in November.

But the kingdom gave Israeli farmers six months to finish growing their crops in Ghumar, a period that expired on Thursday.

Erez Gibori, a farmer from Ghumar whose fields were in the enclave, told AFP Jordan's decision to take back the lands went "against the spirit of the peace agreement."

Gibori said the last farmers, who had grown peppers in the enclave, had left it by Thursday afternoon.

Opinion polls have repeatedly found that the peace treaty with Israel is overwhelmingly opposed by Jordanians, more than half of whom are of Palestinian origin.

Women's bank helps Ivorian children to swap labour for class

Yahoo – AFP, Christophe KOFFI, March 8, 2020

For these Ivorian children, the canteen is a big draw of primary schooling made
possible by village women (AFP Photo/ISSOUF SANOGO)

Kokoti-Kouamekro (Ivory Coast) (AFP) - In a poor farming village in Ivory Coast, women are celebrating a new development that is allowing them to send their children to school instead of working in the country's cocoa plantations.

Until now, many families earning less than a dollar (a euro) a day had no choice but to send their offspring to work beside adults in the fields.

Crippling poverty is a major factor in the widespread use of child labour in Ivory Coast, which is the world's top cocoa producer.

But now with the help of a Swiss-based foundation, women in plantations around Kokoti-Kouamekro are turning to a network of small savings banks with the goal of protecting children.

The International Cocoa Initiative (ICI) has been working since 2007 towards the goal of ending child labour in Ivory Coast and neighbouring Ghana.

The ICI identified 200 child workers out of 900 people on the plantations of Kokoti-Kouamekro, a village of some 2,000 people in the Taabo region, 200 kilometres (125 miles) from Abidjan.

The foundation decided to back about 30 women in an association called Bakpa-elai, which watches out for children's interests.

It helped create a "feminine cell for economic reinforcement (Cefrec)", the formal term for the women's bank.

Since 2018, the ICI has set up 14 Cefrec units in the cocoa-growing parts to specialise in savings and credit with the aim of promoting children.

These local units opened the way for numerous money-making activities, including small shops and other business concerns, in Kokoti-Kouamekro and other villages.

Paying the workers

With seeds, boots and machetes supplied by the ICI, the women of the village association chose to save almost one euro apiece, after harvesting and selling yams, cassava, corn and other food products.

The collected money was placed in a box that requires three "key keepers" with joint access, to reduce any risk of embezzlement or temptation. People who are late for weekly financial meetings are fined.

Village women are also attending classes, with the emphasis on literacy (AFP 

Photo/ISSOUF SANOGO)

"In one year, we mobilised about 3.8 million CFA francs (about 5,800 euros / $6,500), and spent two million, with a positive balance of 1.8 million," said Patricia Kouadio Amami, the president of the association, clad in a multicoloured dress and headscarf.

"Thanks to our bank, we pay the people who work on the land in place of the children we used in the past. One of us has even been able to buy a computer for her student son," Amani said.

Empowered by working together, women are also challenging traditions in a rural culture where the father of the family makes all the decisions. The number of women members of the Bakpa-elai association in Kokoti-Kouamekro doubled in one year.

"I find the women formidable," said Marcel Amani, a cocoa planter.

"We used to send the kids out into the fields. Since the women created this association, all that has stopped," he told AFP. "They deserve our respect."

Child trafficking

The women have also begun classes in reading and writing, but the innovation that most attracted the children was a school canteen.

"The attendance rate has increased," said Lou Horyphine Koffi, head of the school. "The canteen contributes greatly to keeping the child in school."

"The women of Kokoti-Kouamekro have shown that they are capable of finding solutions to their problems by their own resources," said Euphrasie Aka, West and Central Africa coordinator of ICI.

Still, Ivory Coast is a major regional hub for child trafficking from neighbouring countries, some of whom come in search of work.

More than 1.2 million children were taken on by Ivorian cocoa plantations in 2013/2014, according to the ICI.

"We're going to note a worsening of the problem in absolute terms," Aka told AFP ahead of the release of a new ICI report planned for April.

"A high number of producers has emerged on the basis of the rise in cocoa prices... which implicitly leads to a high number of child workers," the organisation said.

Malawi tobacco pressured as US butts in over labour abuses

Yahoo – AFP, Jack MCBRAMS, December 1, 2019

Tobacco is known locally in Malawi as "green gold", but the southern African nation
must wrestle with allegations of child labour if the industry is to have a future
(AFP Photo/GIANLUIGI GUERCIA)

Blantyre (Malawi) (AFP) - Malawi is being forced to confront child and forced labour practices after the US restricted tobacco imports from the impoverished southeastern African nation over allegations workers including children were being exploited.

Although exports to the United States make up only a small part of Malawi's total, the US move could make it harder selling its tobacco elsewhere and has sparked anxiety among farmers who fear they will be forced to accept lower prices.

As tobacco, known locally as "green gold", is Malawi's top crop in terms of employment, foreign exchange earnings (60 percent) and tax revenue (25 percent), any trouble the sector runs into could quickly reverberate throughout the economy.

The US decision piles even more pressure on the tobacco sector, already confronted with global anti-tobacco campaigns.

The trouble began in late October. British law firm Leigh Day announced it was preparing a landmark class action case against British American Tobacco (BAT) on behalf of 2,000 Malawian farmers, including hundreds of children, for forced labour and poverty wages.

BAT, which says it "takes the issue of child labour extremely seriously", has denied any wrongdoing and noted that it buys tobacco from Malawi via international dealers who are required adhere to a code of conduct that does not tolerate child and forced labour.

The US suspended imports of tobacco from Malawi, saying it had information that reasonably indicated it was being produced using forced labour and forced child labour.

Third of children work

According to a survey conducted in 2017 by the country's statistics agency the use of child labour in Malawi is extensive. It found that 38 percent of the country’s children aged between five and 17 were working.

Although the survey did not provide specific information about the tobacco sector, it is widely acknowledged that child labour is a problem.

Betty Chinyamunyamu, who heads an association of smallholder farmers, said incidents of child labour occur despite efforts to eliminate the practice.

"In some cases, farmers may think that that is the way things are supposed to be without knowing that they are engaging in child labour," she said.

Tobacco and Allied Workers Union general secretary Raphael Sandram accused the government of dithering in addressing child labour in the industry.

"In our labour report in 2015, we raised the issue that there were some irregularities in the industry that government needed to address," he said.

"The fact that the government did not respond according to the requirements of the US government means that they delayed to act on these issues. But these issues have been there for a long time," he said.

Malawian children carrying tobacco leaves on a farm in 2009. A government survey 

conducted two years ago found that more than one in three childen work (AFP Photo/

FELIX MPONDA)

Pushing for compliance

Agriculture Minister Kondwani Nankhumwa acknowledged pockets of child and forced labour in Malawi, but downplayed the US action saying it "is not a ban, they are just pushing for compliance".

US authorities said firms wishing to import Malawi tobacco into the country will need to demonstrate it was not produced with forced labour. But what will be needed to convince US authorities and how much effort firms will be willing to take is unclear.

Nankhumwa said 80 percent of Malawi's tobacco was grown under a special scheme which is free from child or forced labour.

"So, we are only grappling with the 20 percent within which there is also some kind of compliance," he said.

The law firm Leigh Day described a tobacco farming system that puts farmers under extreme pressure.

Leaf buyers who sell to multinational tobacco firms make contracts with landowners who then engage tenant farmers who spend 10 months on the plantations. Each tenant farmer is allotted around a hectare but needs four workers to work that amount of land.

"However, the amount the tenant farmers are paid for their crop is too low for them to be able to afford to employ workers to help on the farms. As a result, they have no option but to rely on their children to work on the farms," said Leigh Day in a statement.

Bone of contention

Nankhumwa pledged Malawi would conduct the necessary policy reviews to protect the tobacco industry and bring the country into compliance with global standards.

"The government is reviewing the tenancy system, which is a bone of contention but also perceived to be catalyst for child and forced labour," he said.

Farmers -- who are starting to prepare their fields for the next planting season -- are distraught at the prospect of being squeezed further by falling prices.

"We are baffled and confused," said Alick Yagontha, a small farmer in the northern Rumphi district who has been growing tobacco for two decades and harvested 28,000 kilograms this year.

He fears there will be "no future for tobacco farming in Malawi" if prices fall.

New cocoa deals help peasant farmers, but not enough

Yahoo – AFP, David Esnault in Abidjan with AFP bureau, November 3, 2019

Cocoa farmers use hooked knives to break open the cocoa pods on a plantation
near Sinfra in Ivory Coast's Central region (AFP Photo/ISSOUF SANOGO)

Abidjan (AFP) - The willingness of some multinational firms to pay a cost-of-living bonus for African cocoa planters is welcome but will not save many farmers from grinding poverty, industry sources say.

Ivory Coast and Ghana, which together account for more than 60 percent of global cocoa production, initiated deals with chocolate makers in July, adding a "living income differential" (LID) to prices.

Barry Callebaut and Nestle, two world leaders in cocoa products, confirmed that they would pay a supplement of $400 (almost 360 euros) per tonne above the market price to help farmers, in the wake of announcements during an October meeting of the World Cocoa Foundation in Berlin.

The neighbouring West African countries in June said they would set the minimum price per tonne at $2,600 (2,330 euros) for the 2020/2021 season.

Nestle "have already started buying 2020/2021 cocoa with the living income differential", declared the world's largest food and beverage company in a statement.

"The LID will help improve farmers' living income and complement all our efforts to improving the lives of farmers," it said.

Barry Callebaut, another firm with headquarters in Switzerland, declared that it agrees with the principle enabling the Ivorian and Ghanaian governments to back a minimum cocoa price to cocoa farmers.

'Historic!'

The firm stressed that the LID should be "executed in a way which contributes to sustainability and structurally improves farmer livelihoods, without inducing further expansion of cocoa production into forests."

"This is historic! The two countries together have managed to convince private buyers to raise the purchase price so that producers can earn more," Michel Arrion, executive director of the International Cocoa Organisation (ICO), told AFP.

October cocoa harvest time for a farmer in central Ivory Coast (AFP Photo/

ISSOUF SANOGO)

Ivory Coast, with 40 percent of world production, and Ghana, with 20 percent, pressed hard for a deal that would benefit cocoa planters, who receive only six percent of a global market for cocoa and chocolate valued at $100 billion per year.

The purchase price of cocoa to Ivorian farmers was set at 825 CFA francs (1.25 euros) per kilogram at October's opening of the new cocoa year, a raise of 10 percent, according to the Coffee Cocoa Council (CCC).

Experts in Ivory Coast say that cocoa prices are still too low, even with the LID, since more than half of the million people working in the sector live below the poverty line, earning less than $1.2 per day according to the World Bank.

'Won't change a thing'

"This is a plus for the producers, but even if they were to get the whole of the price increase, it wouldn't lift them out of poverty," said one expert who asked not to be named.

The LID should provide for payments of 1,000 CFA francs (1.52 euros / $1.70) per kilo to Ivorian planters, an improvement on 825 CFA francs (1.25 euros), said Romeo Dou, an agricultural engineer.

His company Microfertile helps cocoa-growing cooperatives to improve cultivation and to process raw cocoa into semi-finished products such as cocoa butter and powder to benefit from the added value.

By way of taxes and intermediaries on the ground, from tax collectors to cooperatives and exporters, the Ivorian state intends to profit from the LID, Dou said.

He believes cocoa planters will end up receiving 60 percent of the LID and the remaining 40 percent would wind up in other hands.

"Even 1,000 CFA francs won't change a thing in the lives of the planters," Dou said.

"The LID business worries us... Which mechanism of the Ivorian state is going to make sure that cocoa planters receive the money they are owed?" asked Moussa Kone, president of a farmers' union.

Kone said that bonuses due to farmers in the name of international fair trade schemes were going unpaid. "For planters to get out of a rut, we need a price of 3,000 CFA francs par kilo," he estimated.

Dou and the anonymous expert both estimated that the sector could only really support one in five of the current planters, or even just one in ten, if they aren't to live in poverty.

"We have to produce better, in an intensive way, on smaller land areas, with well-trained planters. It will take political courage to reform the sector," Dou said.

Lesotho, Africa's medical cannabis pioneer

Yahoo – AFP, Noé Hochet-Bodin, September 4, 2019

Lesotho-based company Medigrow cultivates cannabis legally for the medical 

marijuana industry (AFP Photo/GUILLEM SARTORIO)

Marakabei (Lesotho) (AFP) - Vast white greenhouses sit high up on the slopes of Lesotho's Marakabei town, hidden from view.

It's not fruit or vegetables, however, growing under the 18 plastic covers, but thousands of cannabis plants.

The cannabis is grown legally by the Lesotho-based company Medigrow and is regulated by the government.

"We have three rows that contain 1,200 plants each. That's 3,600 plants across the whole structure," said Medigrow's head of production Albert Theron, gazing proudly over the crop.

In 2017, the tiny landlocked kingdom of 2.1 million people decided to tap into the booming medical marijuana industry, becoming the first country in Africa to allow the cultivation of cannabis for medicinal purposes.

In order to meet legal standards, most traces of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) -- the main psychoactive constituent responsible for marijuana's intoxicating effects -- are removed from the seeds.

In 2017, Lesotho become the first country in Africa to allow the cultivation of

cannabis for medicinal purposes (AFP Photo/GUILLEM SARTORIO)

The remaining medical version is primarily made of the non-psychoactive substance, cannabidiol (CBD), and can only be 0.03 percent THC.

Investing in 'green gold'

Medigrow has invested $19.3 million (17.4 million euros) in cannabis-growing facilities around the country's capital, Maseru.

A heliport is also being built to ensure the cannabis -- commonly referred to as "green gold" -- is shipped safely and swiftly, said head of operations Relebohile Liphoto.

The investment is spurred by the industry's positive outlook.

The global market for medical cannabis is currently estimated at $150 billion (135 billion euros) and could reach $272 billion in 2028, according to Barclays Bank.

"At the moment we have almost 2,000 kilos (4,400 pounds) of biomass and we are going to produce more than 1,000 litres (260 gallons) of CBD oil," said Liphoto.

The global market for medical cannabis is currently estimated at $150 billion
(135 billion euros) and could reach $272 billion in 2028, according to Barclays
Bank (AFP Photo/GUILLEM SARTORIO)

"Depending on the market, we can sell cannabis oil at between $6,000 and $21,000 per litre."

Mostly foreign companies

Nicknamed "Kingdom in the Sky", Lesotho is the only country in the world whose entire territory sits higher than 1,400 metres (4,620 feet) above sea level.

Deputy health minister Manthabiseng Phohleli told AFP that the legalisation of cannabis presented "a huge opportunity for the country", which boasts 300 days of sunshine per year.

"It attracts investors," she said. "So far we have around 10 businesses operating on the territory."

Entirely surrounded by South Africa, Lesotho is also one of the poorest countries in the world, ranking 159 out of 189 in the latest UN Human Development Index.

Unemployment is high, public services are scant and almost a quarter of the population is infected with HIV.

Lesotho's deputy health minister Manthabiseng Phohleli (pictured) said that the 

legalisation of cannabis presented "a huge opportunity for the country" (AFP Photo/

GUILLEM SARTORIO)

The government charges 30,000 euros for a one-year renewable licence to grow cannabis.

But the cost is too steep for most locals, and the market is dominated by foreign companies, mainly from Canada and the United States.

Basothos miss out

Mothiba Thamae has been growing apples, peaches and raisins on 7.5 hectares (18.5 acres) of land for over two decades.

He can not afford the "green gold" licence.

"We hoped the government would give small Basotho farmers the opportunity to cultivate (cannabis) legally," said the 38-year old, referring to Lesotho's main ethnic group.

"Unfortunately they did not."

Year-long sunshine and fertile soils make Lesotho ideal for cannabis plants.

Known as "matekoane" in Lesotho's national language, Sesotho, cannabis has 

been grown for centuries in rural areas (AFP Photo/GUILLEM SARTORIO)

Known as "matekoane" in Sesotho, the country's national language, it has been grown for centuries in rural areas.

"The first historical trace of matekoane dates back to the 16th century," said Laurent Laniel, a researcher at the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction.

"The Koena (people) are believed to have settled in Lesotho around 1550 by buying land from San groups in exchange for marijuana."

'Cannabis money is a bonus'

To this day, cannabis remains an important source of revenue for many small-scale farmers.

Shasha owns a corn field in the centre of the country, on which he has also been growing cannabis illegally for around 20 years.

"The vegetables feed my family. Cannabis money is a bonus," said Shasha. "It allows me to survive and pay for my children's education."

Year-long sunshine and fertile soils make Lesotho ideal for cannabis plants 

(AFP Photo/GUILLEM SARTORIO)

He sells his "matekoane" to a network of dealers like Jama, who smuggles up to 80 kilos of cannabis across the border to South Africa each month.

"That yields between 400 and 500 euros," Jama told AFP.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimates that 70 percent of marijuana consumed in South Africa is grown in Lesotho, making cannabis the country's third source of revenue.

Greenpeace urges more action on central African forest fires

Yahoo – AFP, August 27, 2019

Active fires in sub-Saharan Africa over the last 24 hours. (AFP Photo/
Sabrina BLANCHARD)

Kinshasa (AFP) - Greenpeace on Tuesday called on governments to take more action to combat central African forest fires that have come into the spotlight since the global outcry over blazes burning in Brazil's Amazon rainforest.

The Congo Basin forests - covering parts of DR Congo, Gabon, Congo-Brazzaville and Cameroon - are often referred to as the "second green lung" of the planet after the Amazon.

"Greenpeace Africa calls on the Congo Basin governments to take immediate measures to prevent fires from hitting the rainforest," the environmental group said in a statement.

"For the long-term, governments must end all industrial activity within the world’s second largest rainforest."

Since August 21, more than 6,902 fires in Angola and 3,395 fires in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo have been documented, predominantly in the savanna area, the group said without giving any comparisons from past years.

Like the Amazon, Greenpeace said, the Congo Basin rainforest still faces a risk of being hit again by uncontrolled fires.

Experts say fires in the Amazon are mainly because of climate change and drought whereas in central Africa fires are often seasonal and triggered by traditional slash-and-burn farming methods.

Just like the Amazon, the forests of the Congo Basin absorb tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) in trees and marshes -- seen by experts as a key way to combat climate change.

Most of the fires shown on NASA satellite maps of central Africa are outside sensitive rainforest areas, analysts say, making drawing comparisons to the current Amazon blazes more complicated.

Namibia follows South Africa with land reform pledge

Yahoo – AFP, October 1, 2018

Namibia President Hage Geingob, seen at the UN, said he would push ahead with
 land distribution, citing the "fundamental issue" of "inequality" (AFP Photo/
TIMOTHY A. CLARY)

Windhoek (AFP) - Namibian President Hage Geingob vowed Monday to push ahead with land redistribution, echoing the government of neighbouring South Africa, where the issue has become a fierce political battleground.

Namibia, which was ruled by colonial Germany and then apartheid South Africa until 1990, has large swathes of agricultural land, as well as major diamond and platinum mining industries.

"Many Namibians were driven off their productive land," Geingob said at the opening of a national conference in Windhoek to discuss new land policy.

"The fundamental issue is the inequality... We also share a burning land issue and a racialised distribution of land resources with South Africa.

"This comes from a common history of colonial dispossession. What we also agree to is that the status quo will not be allowed to continue."

Geinob added that "careful consideration should be given to expropriation", but urged that the process remain peaceful.

The conference has been boycotted by several traditional leaders, civil society organisations and political parties for allegedly having predetermined outcomes.

Traditional leaders have called on the government to resettle people on land that belonged to their ancestors.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, who faces elections in 2019, has said expropriating farms without compensating their owners would "undo a grave historical injustice" against the black majority during colonialism and the apartheid era.

Grey gold: Ivory Coast cashes in on the cashew

Yahoo – AFP, Christophe KOFFI, May 30, 2018

Ivory Coast is the world's biggest grower of cashews -- it now hopes to develop the
processing side of the industry, to create jobs and wealth (AFP Photo/ISSOUF SANOGO)

Abidjan (AFP) - Famous for its cocoa and coffee, the Ivory Coast has drawn up an ambitious five-year plan for the cashew industry, seeking to modernise production in a sector where it is already the world's number-one exporter.

"We have shown that we know how to produce the nuts -- now we have to demonstrate that we can sell them and above all process them," Adama Coulibaly of the national Cotton-Cashew Council told AFP.

From tiny harvests two decades ago, the West African country now holds the cashew crown, supplanting India as the biggest producer of the nut.

Helped by price guarantees for farmers, its harvest doubled from 380,000 tonnes in 2013 to 711,000 tonnes in 2017, amounting to 22 percent of global output. This year's production of the nut -- known locally as "grey gold" -- is expected to attain 750,000 tonnes.

Curvy, rich in taste and filled with protein, the cashew is a familiar ingredient in salads, stir-fries and other meals.

But it also features in a widening range of other food products, including cashew butter and cheese, and its oil has found uses in medicine, industrial resins and cosmetics.

$200 mn boost

Ivory Coast has a problem, though: the processing side of its cashew sector is puny -- it is currently equipped to handle only six percent of production.

Cashew nuts are peeled by hand at a factory in Bouake, then batched for export 

around the world (AFP Photo/ISSOUF SANOGO)

This is a classic dilemma for African countries, struggling to get out of the rut of dependence on primary sourcing.

"It's in food processing that the real added value lies... which can generate employment. Ivory Coast cannot allow itself to be merely an exporter of raw materials," Coulibaly told AFP.

In March, the World Bank announced funding of $1 billion (866 million euros) for development purposes in Ivory Coast, including $200 million set aside to support programmes to modernise the cashew sector.

Coulibaly hopes that with finance on this scale, the country might in the coming five years attain "a 50 percent rate of product transformation and 80 percent within the next 10 years."

At present, the sector includes 250,000 producers grouped into a score of cooperatives and employs some 1.5 million people, directly or indirectly.

The government plans to build agro-industrial zones at four population centres -- Bouake in the centre, Korhogo in the north, Bondoukou in the east and Seguela in the northwest.

Economist Yves Ouya said the poverty-mired north and centre of the country had to be beneficiaries of the boom.

"This is extremely important for the government in its fight against endemic poverty in these zones," he said.

Not just nuts: Ivory Coast is hoping to meet the growing demand for cashew oil 

and other spinoffs (AFP Photo/ISSOUF SANOGO)

'A working business'

The cashew's extraordinary success sometimes leads to speculation -- by traders who buy nuts below the floor price fixed by the state and hope to sell it on at a profit -- and to smuggling to neighbouring countries.

According to official estimates, between 20,000 and 50,000 tonnes of production is diverted this way each year. The authorities recently responded by ramping up the legal arsenal to deal with such offences, which also affect the cocoa industry.

Kouadio Djedri, a planter in his 60s at N'Zere village near the capital Yamoussoukro, likes to talk about how profitable the cashew business can be.

"I started out growing cashew nuts 20 years ago, when the product sold for 50 CFA francs (0.07 euros/$0.08) per kilo," the farmer, wearing a cowboy hat and green boots, said.

"From a harvest of 200 kilos -- two bags -- in my early days, this year I've grown 13 tonnes for sale at 500 CFA francs per kilo," he said.

Djedri, who is also village chief, has a cashew plantation of 11 hectares (27 acres) and plans to expand over a further 13 hectares.

"I tell young people to go into growing cashew nuts. It's a working business that has enabled me to send my children to school," he said.

New set-up for Rabobank in Africa to pool interests

DutchNews, March 16, 2017

Rabobank’s headquarters in Utrecht. Photo: Depositphotos.com

Dutch cooperative bank Rabo, which has a broad presence in the African agricultural sector, has joined new consortium Arise to pool the interests of its three partners in Africa, the Financieele Dagblad said on Thursday. 

Arise, which now has investments in more than 20 African countries with a total valuation of $660m, expects to expand its investment portfolio to €1bn. Rabobank has a 25% stake in Arise. Its partner Dutch development bank FMO holds 27% and Norway’s Norfund own the remaining shares. 

Arise bought a 27.7% stake in CAL Bank of Ghana for €24m last month. CAL had a balance sheet total of €737m in mid-2016. The bank booked after-tax profit of €14.3m in the first six months of last year. 

The consortium also bought parts of Ghana-based Crane Bank for an undisclosed sum at the end of January. Crane was formerly owned by Ghana’s richest man Sudhir Ruparelia but after irregularities were discovered it was placed under the protection of the Ghana central bank.

Vanilla and spice next to bloom in Dutch greenhouses

Yahoo – AFP, Maude Brulard, November 12, 2016

University of Wageningen researcher Filip van Noort and vanilla grower Joris
Elstgeest inspect vanilla orchids, part of four years of ground-breaking research
(AFP Photo/Maude Brulard)

Bleiswijk (Netherlands) (AFP) - Flowers more exotic than the humble tulip will soon flourish for the first time in Dutch greenhouses after intensive research into growing the capricious vanilla orchid to harvest one of the world's most expensive spices.

In the middle of potato fields in a central Dutch rural town, scientists from Wageningen University have for the past four years been nurturing vanilla orchids. And their research has been deemed a success.

"Based on our information, businesses believe vanilla is a plant with a lot of potential for Dutch greenhouses and have decided to start growing it," said researcher Filip van Noort.

How many orchids will be planted will be decided at the start of the next growing season in the spring, and it will take at least three years before the first Dutch-grown vanilla hits the market.

In Bleiswijk, home to the ground-breaking research, vines from about 100 plants stretch metres high in hot, tropical greenhouses. Hidden under fleshy, oval-shaped leaves are the buds, that will eventually become the vanilla pods so prised by chefs the world over.

"The challenge is to ensure the plants blossom and then to be able to pollinate them in a cost-effective way," said van Noort.

Cultivation of the vanilla orchid is hugely labour intensive as the orchid's flowers 

only last one day and must be pollinated by hand if they are to produce fruit

 (AFP Photo/Maude Brulard)

Black gold

Cultivation is hugely labour intensive. The orchid's flowers only last one day and must be pollinated by hand if they are to produce fruit. So it was an apt challenge for the Dutch -- renowned for their green fingers and their expertise in greenhouse cultivation.

"A few years ago we were looking for new plants which could be grown in Dutch greenhouses," explained van Noort.

The aim was to increase the variety of crops grown by Dutch farmers as they search for improved profits.

Vanilla made sense. Currently the Indian Ocean island of Madagascar holds a quasi-monopoly over world supply producing some 80 percent of global vanilla bean stocks.

It is also the world's second most expensive spice, with prices climbing to 350 euros ($380) a kilo this month -- compared with 60 euros in 2014.

"In the past the price was too low to be interesting. But today, with demand increasing, the prices are rising," said orchid expert Joris Elstgeest.

The long, black vanilla pods, with their distinctive caramel and at times woody scent, have to be collected by hand from the vines and then dried before being sold.

It is the sticky tiny black seeds scraped from inside the pods which are a baker's delight, lending an almost intoxicating flavour to everything from cakes and ice-cream.

The long, black vanilla pods, with their distinctive caramel and at times woody scent, 

have to be collected by hand from the vines and then dried before being sold 

(AFP Photo/Maude Brulard)

All organic

Originating from Mexico, the vanilla orchid was brought to Europe by Spanish explorer Christopher Columbus. But all attempts to grow it in milder climates failed for lack of the type of bee which pollinated the flowers.

It was not until 1841 that someone on the island of Reunion figured out how to pollinate the flowers one-by-one.

That method finally paved the way towards large-scale production, with Madagascar proving the most effective of growers.

But even if prices fall and as other countries explore possible vanilla crops, Dutch growers believe it will prove a good investment.

In past decades, synthetic vanilla flavourings were increasingly adopted by the food industry. But with a return to all things authentic and organic, the real stuff is making a welcome return.

Bleiswijk vanilla is wholly organic, say its Dutch growers, unlike in Madagascar, they claim.

Vanilla is also the world's second most expensive spice, with prices climbing

 to 350 euros ($380) a kilo this month -- compared with 60 euros in 2014 

(AFP Photo/Maude Brulard)

Half of Madagascar's vanilla is exported to Europe, and a third to the United States. But clients say the quality has been slipping, with producers harvesting the pods before they reach maturity to cash in on the price boom.

Some Madagascans even speculate the vanilla industry is being used as a front for the illegal trade in rosewood –- a sought-after product in China.

The Dutch consortium behind the project says it has already received lots of interest from local high-end restaurants as well as food companies.

The Netherlands is a global leader in the art of greenhouse growing with almost 10,000 hectares of this lowlands country set with rows of glasshouses growing all kinds of flowers, fruits and vegetables -- compared to just 1,900 hectares in France.

And researchers are already setting their sights on other spices.

"We've also got black pepper, which seems to be adapting well," said van Noort, adding indigo used to dye blue jeans was another project.

And perhaps saffron -- the world's most expensive spice derived from the saffron crocus -- could be next to flourish here.