Kenya has overcome the phytosanitary hurdles it once faced to export avocados to China, with a first shipment sent to the lucrative Asian market earlier this week, a development that has a market value of more than $15 billion for 2022, says Statista.
According to the market analytics firm, outflows of the super fruit to China from the East African producer could be more than just a shot in the arm for Kenya’s economy, and it’s not difficult to see why.
Whereas one avocado sells for less than a dollar in Kenya – $0.04 to be exact – international prices can go as high as $0.38 per fruit.
With such promising prospects, “green gold” farming in Kenya, with the express purpose of exporting Hass variety avos, saw production grow from 66 million tonnes in 2018 to 86 million in 2021.
Those figures though are from a pre-China position, when Kenyan exports were restricted to Europe and the Middle East.
Now, with the introduction of an Asian market made up of 1.4 billion consumers, exports from Kenya could double, according to Benjamin Tito, director of the Horticulture Crops Directorate at the Agriculture and Food Authority in Nairobi.
Kenya’s avocado breakthrough into the Chinese market makes it the first African country to pass Chinese muster for the fruit, and positions the country as the sixth-largest exporter of avos globally.
The success of Kenya’s avocados in a market previous sealed off is thanks to raised standards, Chinese Embassy executive Zhang Yijun has said.
Whereas previously it failed plant-health checks during 2018’s Canton Fair for imports and exports held in Guangzhou, China, Kenyan avos are now described as “high in quality” out east.
Still, exports to China are subject to an import duty of 7% compared to avocados from Peru and Mexico, zero-rated thanks to free-trade arrangements with the government of Xi Jinping.
Nevertheless, Kenya’s first bulk shipment of fresh avos – due in Shanghai in early September – looks set to radically ramp up output by Rift Valley growers such as Sunripe and Kakuzi PLC.
Sunripe, for one, has indicated that they are ready to push out produce destined for China once a week.
Along with 13 other local farms that were earmarked for exports to China, both Sunripe and Kakuzi were subjected to stringent inspections before this week’s historic shipment.
