Marketing of Indigenous Fruits in Southern Africa - Indigenous Fruit Trees in the Tropics: Domestication, Utilization and Commercialization - page 235

Improving the hygienic situation by practices such as washing, grading and
packing will make the fruits more attractive to consumers and hence increase
sales and benefit the rural poor.
The natural resource management policies and socio-cultural settings of the
southern African countries involved in the domestication project are unlike
those of Zimbabwe. There is a need to compile information on the existing
marketing systems and the factors that influence the system in Malawi,
Tanzania and Zambia, as these countries have different natural resource
management policies and socio-cultural characteristics. The pooled findings of
the study described in this chapter will help in drawing appropriate conclusions
to facilitate the commercialization of regional indigenous fruits.
The shelf life of U. kirkiana fruits could be improved by further research on
ways of introducing small-scale enterprises for traders. These enterprises could
cooperate with each other, apply for loans and buy storage facilities. With these
storage facilities it should be possible to keep the fruits for a longer time and
hence foster a steady market supply and even out the short-term inequalities
between supply and demand. This might facilitate the flow of fruits to different
and distant markets with minimum losses, help to increase the producers'
bargaining power and improve returns to traders. Lastly, follow-up research to
monitor changes in patterns of consumption and marketing activities is
necessary. It would be worthwhile to document the advantages of increased
production of fruits, such as increased consumption and better nutrition, and
the disadvantages, such as reduced labour availability for the production of
food crops, and to take appropriate measures to remedy the disadvantages
identified.
Acknowledgements
The study described in this chapter was made possible by financial support
from the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF)/Bundesministerium Fur
Wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit (BMZ) and the Institute of Horticultural
Economics, University of Hanover. The author would like to thank Professor Dr
Erich Schimdt for his time and professional advice, and Drs Elias Ayuk and
Freddie Kwesiga for field guidance. The author also expresses her appreciation
of the help received from all the traders and consumers who provided
information, and of the logistic support given by staff members of ICRAF-
Zimbabwe and the Institute of Horticultural Economics, University of Hanover.