Zimbabwe eyes Chinese chilli market

BUSINESS Economic Empowerment Federation (BEEF) seeks to tap into the Chinese chilli market taking advantage of new regulatory requirements put in place by the European Union regarding false codling moth (FCM) which bans the imports of chilli from non pest-free production locations.

Last year, the EU gazetted that for the first time, imports of citrus fruit must undergo specified mandatory cold treatment processes and pre-cooling steps for specific periods of up to 25 days of cold treatment before importation.

Just like the citrus sector, chilli producers should also comply with the regulations which need more infrastructure and paperwork, which is now affecting the export of the locally produced African Birds Eye Chilli.

In a statement, Beef said from their past engagements they have successfully completed an agreement with Malawian chilli buyers to sell and export African Birds Eye Chilli from Zimbabwe through their own established export channels.

However, due to damage to infrastructure countrywide and the collapse of warehouses in Blantyre following the devastating Cyclone Freddy, plans were subsequently put on hold in February before a chilli ban on all fresh and dried chillies was placed on Zimbabwean chilli exports to the EU market.

The federation however came up with a plan to promote farmers who are into chilli production and partnered with other stakeholders to promote non-organic chilli production which has a guaranteed market in China.

“In the month of June 2023 after receiving confirmation that we were still on hold from our partners in Malawi, our organisation decided to map out a new initiative by partnering with an alternative programme in order to continue promoting chilli growing, meet the planting season, and avoid disappointing farmers.

“BEEF Agriculture entered a partnership with Shumba Tafari to grow a non-organic chilli (that can also be grown organically) and paprika exported to a guaranteed market in China. The chilli, unlike African Birds Eye is grown in two seasons per year in Zimbabwe,” reads a statement from BEEF.

“We encourage our BEEF Agriculture Farmers to join and support this initiative while we work to progress our partnership with Malawi and seek to work towards achieving full compliance with EU regulations.”

Chilli production has been identified as a lucrative agro business venture with good potential even for the Matabeleland region which has good land, favourable climate conditions as well as able farmers to get into chilli

farming.

Different organisations are now engaged in chilli production by supporting farmers in different provinces to produce the product for the export market.

This has seen the national trade development and promotion organisation partnering with development partners to improve chilli production as a way to improve exports.

BEEF Agriculture and Shumba Tafari will be hosting free training programmes to encourage the sign-up of farmers and to educate them on the Tejaswini Chilli this month of July 2023 for the planting season of August 2023. — @SikhulekelaniM1