Drying for a Living

Hey, Hannatu here 👋

In the big cities of Nigeria, like Abuja where I live, a basket of tomatoes costs ₦75,000 ($54).

But in Jos or Kaduna (North Central Nigeria), where most of Nigeria's tomatoes are grown, farmers sell the same basket for ₦25,000 ($18).

It's not generosity. It's survival.

If the farmers in smaller cities don’t sell their tomatoes within a week, they rot.

But this doesn’t just happen in Nigeria. In fact, it’s…

Africa produces over 20 million metric tons of fresh tomatoes annually. 

Nigeria alone harvests 2.5 million metric tons. Ghana produces about 420,000 metric tons. 

Yet, some estimate that about 40% of the tomatoes Africa produces are lost before they reach consumers.

In places like Nigeria, it’s as high as 45% of the harvest.

Fresh tomatoes have a cruel timeline in African heat.

From the moment they're picked, the clock starts.

→ Day one: firm and sellable

→Day two: still good, but softening

→Day three: soft, overripe

→Day four: rotting.

This five-day window is all farmers have to get tomatoes from rural farms to urban markets. 

And with no cold chain storage, there’s no way to slow this countdown.

Most African tomato farmers are smallholders growing tomatoes on 1-2 acres. 

They harvest during the peak season of May to August, when everyone else is harvesting too. 

In those times, the markets are flooded with fresh tomatoes, and prices crash.

A kilogram that would sell for ₦7,000 ($5) during the dry period drops to ₦2,500 ($2) because supply overwhelms demand.

Then comes the dry season. No tomatoes available. Prices spike. 

If farmers could store their surplus from peak seasons, they could sell it for a fortune during the high-priced dry season.

The problem is, fresh tomatoes rot within days.

So, why not just process them?

It’s the obvious solution, right?

Turn all those fresh tomatoes into paste, puree, or powder during the harvest. And then sell them year-round at stable prices.

Problem solved.

…..except, it’s not.

This "obvious" solution is a trap. It’s the Big Factory Fallacy.

Industrial processing means industrial equipment. We’re talking pulpers, evaporators, sterilizers, and packaging lines. 

A basic plant costs tens of thousands of dollars.

That's an impossible investment for a smallholder farmer or a local co-op.

And even if these plants exist, they would be useless without one non-negotiable ingredient: reliable electricity.

Processing plants run 24/7 during harvest. 

A single power cut in rural Nigeria, Ghana, or Kenya doesn't just pause the work. It spoils the entire batch. It’s a total waste of money, time, and tomatoes.

The Big Factory model has one more fatal flaw: it's centralized.

It assumes you can get thousands of tons of fresh, perishable tomatoes from scattered farms to one central location, fast.

But in many tomato-growing regions in Africa, the roads are terrible. That 18-hour trip from the farm? It stretches to three days during the rainy season.

The tomatoes rot in the truck before they even reach the factory.

Even the large, well-funded processors can't solve this.

They're beaten by the same two enemies: no power and no roads.

So the paradox is complete: a sea of red gold, with no way to save it.

One peek under the hood, and we see the answer.

Two Nigerian startups realized they didn't need to replicate industrial processing plants. 

They could solve the fundamental problem, stopping tomato rot, at village scale.

OGV Limited built solar drying centers across Nigeria and West Africa. 

Its technology preserves tomatoes, peppers, and fruits using only solar energy.

The system is simple. Farmers bring fresh produce to drying centers. Solar dryers remove moisture hygienically over 1-2 days. 

The result is shelf-stable dried tomatoes that can be stored for months.

No electricity needed. No spoilage risk. No expensive machinery.

NaFarm Foods in Kaduna, Nigeria, took the concept further. 

They developed a hybrid solar food dryer combining solar electricity with thermal heat.

Pure solar drying fails during Nigeria's rainy season when cloud cover blocks the sun. 

NaFarm's hybrid system keeps operating regardless of the weather. 

Continuous processing means farmers can preserve tomatoes even during the wettest months of May to September.

The innovation earned Nafarm the $1 million Zayed Sustainability Prize. 

The farm has also reached 65,000 smallholder farmers across six northern Nigerian states. 

Now, they’re even converting the tomatoes into paste for more utility.

Both companies are proving the same thing: processing that doesn't require factories

Processing that is accessible to farmers where they actually are.

A farmer cooperative in Kaduna State works with OGV. 

Twenty members grow tomatoes on small plots. 

During harvest, each farmer brings their crop to the community solar drying center.

Fresh tomatoes that would have sold for ₦2,500 ($2) per kilogram during glut season now become dried tomatoes, selling for ₦8,000 ($6) per kilogram year-round.

The math transforms. 

A farmer who previously earned ₦200,000 ($142) during peak season while watching half the crop spoil now earns ₦500,000 ($380) by processing and storing everything.

The dried product also has eager buyers. 

Local food processors use dried tomatoes in spice mixes and sauces. 

Urban restaurants prefer the concentrated flavor of dried tomato. 

And export markets in Europe and North America buy premium dried African tomatoes.

NaFarm's model includes training. 

They teach farmers how to operate dryers, maintain equipment, and meet food safety standards.

The cooperatives that work with them become processing businesses, not just farming operations.

Members take turns managing the drying center. 

This creates year-round jobs in communities that previously only had seasonal farm work.

Reaching 65,000 farmers is significant, but Nigeria alone has over 4 million tomato farmers. 

The gap between current reach and total need is massive.

The technology works. The business model is proven. The challenge now is scaling.

Three barriers stand in the way:

The solar drying model solves post-harvest loss for any crop that spoils quickly.

Peppers. Mangoes. Pineapples. Leafy vegetables. 

Each faces the same five-day countdown. Each could benefit from simple preservation technology.

OGV already works with multiple crops. Their drying centers process whatever farmers bring during harvest seasons. 

This keeps money flowing year-round - when tomato season ends, mango season begins.

The template is replicable across Africa. Solar drying works in Ghana, Kenya, Ethiopia, anywhere the sun shines and crops spoil.

Each successful deployment proves the model and encourages nearby farmers to adopt.

If solar drying reached even 20% of Africa's tomato farmers, the impact would be enormous.

For small farmers, success means never again choosing between selling cheap or watching crops spoil. It means stable income instead of seasonal boom-bust cycles.

For communities, it means value-added agriculture that creates jobs beyond farming. It means young people see opportunity in rural areas instead of migrating to cities.

The technology exists. The business model works. The farmers are ready.

Now it's about getting solar dryers into thousands more villages and training thousands more cooperatives to become processing businesses.

NaFarn and OGV are proving it's possible. 

The next phase is making it inevitable.

Where should this solar revolution go next?

👉🏾Tell us here.

Cheers,