Vanilla export in Uganda recorded a significant increase after it surpassed the Shs16b annual average earning for the first time in the last 10 years.
According to the latest data by the Bank of Uganda, Vanilla export earned the country Shs41.49b by the end of December 2022 indicating a massive growth from just Shs13.18b earned in the same period in 2021 and in the previous years.
The data also indicates that the commodity export increased to 95.6 million kilos as compared to 24 million kilos exported during the same period in 2021.
Kato Pito, the Chief Executive Officer at Kilembe Vanilla Exporters attributes the increase to a recent government policy in Madagascar, the biggest vanilla export competitor of Uganda in Africa, which sets the price of green vanilla at a minimum of $200 as compared to $50 in Uganda.
“The new policy,” said Pito, “could have discouraged investors who are now looking for other sources of vanilla that include Uganda.”
Also, this could be as a result of a recent cyclone in Madagascar, which damaged the country’s vanilla sector as it was in early 90s when the crop’s cultivation was ravaged by a storm lead in the country leading to an export boom in Uganda.
Uganda mainly exports vanilla extract which is lower in quality and value as compared to vanilla gourmet. This low quality has been as a result of premature harvest and poor post-harvest handling by farmers.
“Our farmers are sometimes forced to rush the harvest of the crop to avoid theft something that has compromised quality, falling below the desirable 1.6 per cent,” said Fred Kyakulaga Bwino, Agriculture State Minister.
Government promoting vanilla production
Vanilla is currently grown in more than 32 districts with a high concentration in western, central, and eastern Uganda since it has become a strategic commodity promoted by the government under the National Development Plan III.
This has made Uganda to be the seventh exporter of vanilla in the world and the third in Africa behind Madagascar (which is the world’s largest exporter) and Reunion Island.
Uganda’s Ministry of Agriculture projects vanilla exports to grow by 5.17 per cent on an annual basis from the current 1.7 per cent, driven by a rise in demand for natural vanillin flavours in the global markets.
Vanilla production
In 2018, Uganda produced about 300,000Kg of Vanilla and exported 23,000Kg of cured vanilla worth USD 6.40 million.
In 2017 and 2018, the major importing countries for Ugandan vanilla included USA, France, United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Canada, Denmark, Netherlands, Israel, South Africa, Turkey and Hungary.
