Creating Opportunities for Domesticating and Commercializing Miombo Indigenous Fruit Trees in Southern Africa - Indigenous Fruit Trees in the Tropics: Domestication, Utilization and Commercialization - page 160

postharvest losses were a major constraint for Uapaca kirkiana . While damage
due to fruit harvesting was noted by a few people as a problem (16%), insect
pests (61%), mechanical damage during transportation and storage (61-88%)
were mentioned by a high proportion of respondents. Similarly, Ramadhani
(2002) found that 50-75% of marketers associated market constraints with the
perishability of fruits. At the market there was no agreed number of fruits a
consumer could taste freely before buying. Consequently, large numbers of
fruits were tasted, and 75% of wholesalers reported this as a major problem,
followed by retailers (63%); the problem was less for collectors (producers)
(Ramadhani, 2002).
Harvesting time has been shown to affect ripening and darkening in
Uapaca kirkiana (Kadzere et al. , 2006c, d). Fruits that were harvested in
December lost less weight (14%) in storage than those that were harvested 2
weeks earlier (34%). The soluble sugar content measured 6 days after harvest
was also lower for fruits harvested in December (18%) compared with those
harvested in November (9%). This indicates that there are benefits in delaying
harvesting to improve fruit skin colour at harvest and during storage, such as
reduced weight loss and maintaining a higher soluble sugar content.
8.4.2 Small-scale fruit processing enterprises
In terms of fruit processing, there have been reports of small cottage industries
in different countries in the region, such as wine production from Syzygium
owariense , Uapaca kirkiana , tamarinds, mangoes and other fruits, such as
those commercialized in the past as Mulunguzi wine in Malawi (Ngwira, 1996).
Ziziphus mauritiana and Sclerocarya birrea are produced at export quality in
Lusaka, Zambia. Amarula liqueur is commercialized in South Africa and sold in
more than 63 countries world-wide (Ham, 2005). In Tanzania, about 198 rural
women were trained in 1998 in making wine, jam and juice from indigenous
fruits, and 2 years later they had trained another 2045 processors (Saka et al. ,
2004, Chapter 16, this volume; Akinnifesi et al. , 2006). Details on the
nutritional characteristics and processing of the fruits have been given
elsewhere (Saka et al ., Chapter 16, this volume). The feasibilities of four
different enterprises developed by ICRAF-CP Wild in Malawi, Zambia, Tanzania
and Zimbabwe were assessed and the results have been detailed by Jordaan et
al. (Jordaan et al. , Chapter 15, this volume).
8.4.3 Commercialization of wild-harvested fruits
A global meta-analysis of the marketing and cultivation of wild forest products
showed that farmers engaged in the cultivation of indigenous fruits had higher
returns to labour, used more intensive production technologies, produced more
per hectare and benefited from a more stable resource base than those that
relied on wild collection (Ruiz-Perez et al ., 2004). The analysis suggests that
cultivation of wild fruit trees will become more important as rural households