Cover_Rebuilding West Africas Food Potential

360 Rebuilding West Africa’s food potential

The oil palm product value chain can be divided into three segments: value addition from the trunks, the

fruits and the empty fruit bunches. The fresh fruit bunch (FFB) is perhaps the more important element in

the value chain. It yields the nuts and the CPO. The CPO provides a popular cooking oil in West Africa

and it can also be further processed to yield other industrial and food products (see Figure 6). The empty

fruit bunches can be used as fuel, in particle board and as fertilizers in plantations.

Figure 6. The Oil Palm Product Value Chain

Source: MofA (2010)

Palm oil, palm kernel and PKO are the main products of the oil palm; however, the trees and the processing

wastes generated when the fruits are processed to obtain palm oil and palm kernel also have several uses. The

sludge is used in making traditional soaps and fertilizer and the palm kernel cake is used widely as an input in the

feed industry and for fertilizer. In addition, the palm tree, particularly the trunk, can be used as fuel or converted

to plywood, and the palm branches and leaves can be used for fibre in basket weaving and for brooms.

4.2 Prevailing Business Models and Contractual Arrangements

for the Different Products and Production

In Ghana, crops produced under various forms of contract arrangements include cotton, oil palm,

pineapple and, to a lesser extent, mango and citrus. In the oil palm industry, the prevailing business

models currently linking smallholders in the industry in the investment strategy are: (a) the nucleus-

smallholder; (b) outgrower farmers who sharecrop, rent or own their land outside the confines of the

estate; and (c) independent smallholder farmers.

The nucleus-smallholder model involves smallholder farmers cropping on the land that belongs to the

estate after acquisition of the land. The farmers are structurally bound by contract to a particular oil palm

Oil

palm

Fruit

Empty

bunch

Nut

Trunk

Fibre Pulp paper

Crude

palm oil

kernel sludge shell Palm cake

Energy, paper,

fertilizer, particle

board

Energy, ply-wood,

furniture, starch

Frying oil, oleo-

chemical, energy Soap, fertilizer,

animal feed

Activated carbon,

particle board,

energy

Animal feed,

fertilizer,

Detergent,

biodiesel

Frying oil,

margarine, cocoa

butter substitute