Identifying Challenges and Opportunities on the Development of Sustainable Vegetable Agro-industries in the National Regional State of Tigray

Abstract

This research was commenced with the objective of identifying the major challenges and opportunities on the development of sustainable vegetable agro-industries in the National Regional State of Tigray. There is unexploited capacity on the production of vegetables that can provide sufficient inputs for vegetable agro-industries and both the amount of area coverage and yield per hectare of vegetable production are increasing from time to time in the region. However, there are not vegetable agro-industries that could transform the vegetable production sector and enhance the income of growers. Hence, a research is required to answer the question why there are not vegetable agro-industries in the region. One way of answering this question is to detect the major challenges and opportunities on the development of such industries. As a result, this thesis has detected some challenges and opportunities taking the case of Enderta wereda through applying key informants method of data collection. Since the data collected are qualitative, the data analysis is performed in such a way that the researcher first edited the data to ensure the completeness, consistency and meaningfulness and then interpreted them based on the literature on hand. Some of the challenges detected by this research are increasing price and scarcity of agricultural inputs, weak rural infrastructure, low attitude of investors, and lack of capital and expertise. The ongoing increase in vegetable products, favorable policy environment and increasing demand for processed vegetables are some of the identified opportunities. Finally, the researcher recommended that the current increase in the production of different vegetables should keep on by incorporating quality controlling mechanisms so that sustainable supply of raw materials could be assured for the intended vegetable agro-industries; the development of vegetable agro-industries should be in a sustainable way so that they offer permanent employment, generate income tax and profit for the concerned stake holders; and the development of vegetable agro-industries must be environmental friendly.