Rethinking tomatoes in Ghana

Project Kenten?is part of the IAU Programme sponsored by the British Council and delivered by Durham University and RMU, Ghana. Kenten is a focus on Post Harvest Losses (PHL)which are running at 40 per cent from field to fork. We are focussed on okra, onions, ginger and tomatoes and ideas are surfacing – so too are challenges beyond our scope. This piece reflects on tomatoes, the pressure from cheap imports and the threat to value for money and impact for Global Aid budgets.?

Wild tomatoes originated in the Andes Mountains of Peru; its name derived from the Aztec word tomatl.?Today, 4,000 kilos of tomatoes are consumed globally every second. That’s around 120 million tonnes grown and harvested every year.?In Ghana, over 450,000 tonnes of tomato are consumed annually – equivalent to 40 per cent of household vegetable expenditure.?

There are over 500 varieties of tomato – though lean business thinking eliminates such diversity. The market is split into fresh for street markets and processed industrial output in canned and paste formats as an ingredient for dishes and sauces.??

Project Kenten has mapped the field to fork process running pilots on soils, seeds, harvesting techniques, transport and handling as well as prices in the markets and standards in food processing. The Tomato market is proving a challenge with PHL at 62 per cent. And early conclusion was to ignore processed varieties – canned and paste – because of imports distorting the market. Here’s why.

The global tomato market since 2000 has been transformed with China racing to become a major player producing concentrate that sells in over 130 countries at unbeatable prices.??Chinese cuisine is not big on tomatoes. The big player has been Cofco Tunhe led by General Liu. With plants in Western Provinces like Xinjiang they have overtaken the Italians with African markets a boost on volumes. General Liu sums up the position: “Xi Jinping has launched the Belt and Road Initiative. Xinjiang is where it begins, and Ghana where it ends.” Liu sees huge export potential and even domestic expansion as money rich time poor consumers favour fast food – with all its sauces.??

In Ghana, Chinese tomato sauce is so cheap that locally grown tomatoes can no longer find buyers. Imports have risen 30x in 15 years, and the last national tomato processing plant was shut down in 2012. China has even opened a factory to produce tomato sauce in Ghana itself. Whatever the PHL solutions, what are the chances for Ghanaian tomatoes?

We needed to understand context.A web trawl reveals that from 2005, the UKs Guardian. Les Echos, France and El Mundo, Spain and others have run articles on the use of forced labour in China to produce tomatoes for global markets. Milet’s L’Empire de L’Or Rouge (2017) is a comprehensive survey of the global tomato market. It makes harsh reading on work practices.?

Early 2022, Canada’s CBC Marketplace, an investigative show, took up the case. Global Retailers such as Walmart stock Heinz, Delmonte, Unilever, Nestle and Own Label brands supplied from Asia. In fact the tomatoes are grown in Xinjiang, China and supplied by Cofco Tunhe – processed as spaghetti sauce and ketchup in their factories and exported as products of Philippines, Pakistan and India. Across North America and the EU, packaging does not have to state provenance of harvest - just where they are packed!

Elsewhere, researcher Adrian Zenz has uncovered endemic and systemic use of Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities in oppressive working conditions enabling canned tomatoes and paste to grab significant market share globally. In 2021 the US Government have banned tomato and cotton imports from Xinjiang Researcher. Having been exposed several brands have cut ties. Italian brands stopped using Xinjiang tomatoes for the USA and Canadia. They are sent instead to the UK and Australia. Petti of Italy “only uses Xinjiang products in their African markets”.?

Is it acceptable for Retailers to sell products that undercut the market because of forced labour? This is killing Africa’s home grown tomato producers who cannot compete with cheap imports. Worse, this is undermining Western Government Agri Business related Aid Projects. Investing in processing plants is unsustainable if we continue to turn a blind eye to immoral not just unfair working and exporting practices.?

For Project Kenten, this means back to basics - highlight the issue and focus on tomatoes for the street markets. No one can compete with processed options as long as we ignore systemic abuse of human rights in the name of free trade. Mind you, we need to solve those post harvest losses and watery tomatoes from Ghanaian fields - that's our focus but, why ignore the bigger issue?