CAMEROON – A recent document issued by the National Sector of Association (Assobacam) revealed that the export rate of bananas in Cameroon for August 2023 has reduced by 12.2 %.

According to the release, the drastic drop in volume of the fresh produce exports occurred despite the state-owned CDC’s record-breaking banana shipment that year.

Statistically, CDC exported 2,795 tons of bananas in August 2023 which was 74% higher than the export volume of 1,605 in August 2022.

“This is the highest export volume achieved by CDC since the beginning of the year,” Assobacam states.

Until then, the companies highest recorded performance was in June 2023 where a total shipment of 2,617 tons of bananas in Cameroon was made followed by January’s 2,592 tons.

“This was made possible thanks to the efforts made by the government to ensure the security of the company’s equipment after the troubling episode that came with the Anglophone crisis,” commented the Technical Committee for the Rehabilitation of Public and Parastatal Sector Enterprises (CTR) on this turnaround.

However, despite CDC’S field day, the two other market players in the sector; Plantations du Haut Penja (PHP) and Boh Plantations, have reported a decline over the period in question.

Cameroon is the leading banana exporter in Africa with Njombe Penja as its highest producing region.

PHP is the top company that runs the banana plantations in Penja alongside other plantations across the country.

As the market leader, the company posted a 22.5% decline in the consignment of the fresh produce with only 9,996 tons of bananas shipped in August 2023, against 12, 899 tons in August 2022.

This performance has been ranked as the third worst by the company since the start of the year 2023. The reducing trend was seen in May and July each recording 9,761 tons and 8,714 tons respectively.

Boh Plantations, another banana exporting company in Cameroon, experienced a decline in exports to 1,024 tons during the period under review, representing a 16.7% decrease from the 1,229 tons recorded in August 2022.

Different factors periodically affect the Cameroonian banana sector including the high cost of inputs imposed by international markets, along with climate change and its accompanying adverse effects.

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