Thousands of specialty foods buyers flock to the Summer Fancy Food Show in New York City every year, looking for new products. West African foods are winning their attention – even if they are not saying it too loudly.

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“You had the CEO and the principal buyer for a major specialty foods retailer looking at product,” said Derryck Cox, a specialty foods expert working with the West Africa Trade Hub and its sister projects in East Africa and Southern Africa. “If the price points are there, these products are set to go.”

Buyers are somewhat quiet about their moves, Cox explained, because the competition in the industry is so fierce: No one wants to tip his hand on what products she will choose. But African foods – an incredibly diverse selection reflecting the continent’s hundreds of cultures and centuries of culinary influences from around the world – are a logical choice, he said.

“Because Africa is a new player in the game, there is interest in it,” Cox said, but companies cannot take the interest for granted. “They need to have unique products – different – and made with good raw materials. The price has to be right, too.”

Ebenut Ghana Limited was one producer picking up on the interest.

“I’m here to look for market, especially for my new product, jollof rice,” said Paully Appia-Kubi, the company’s owner. “It’s a one-pot meal from Ghana, a main meal, and I’m sure Americans will like it. It’s a national dish in Ghana, it’s so delicious.”

The Taste of Africa pavilion, a collaboration of the trade hubs, put the products in the best possible light. Spicy sauces, succulent preserves and fruit jellies, rich coffee and crunchy cashews sparkled in the spotlights of more than a dozen booths including more than 30 companies from more than 20 countries.

A steady stream of visitors kept representatives chatting from morning to evening – not just of the companies but of national export promotion councils (Senegal’s was busy), U.S. missions (the Gambia’s was tireless) and AGOA Resource Centers (Cape Verde’s center representative was on hand to discuss the country’s coffee and other products).

In addition to the opportunity to connect with buyers, the Fancy Food Show allows companies to connect with service providers and see the latest in technology. A device that prints and then automatically applies labels to bottles was spinning busily in one booth; in another a device was electromagnetically scanning food for the presence of metals.

“The show lets me see different types of packaging,” explained Appea-Kubi of Ebenut, herself a trained food scientist. “I can also taste other people’s flavors and see how I can improve mine.”

Attending the show also creates visibility, explained Kees Blokland, a member of the African Cashew Alliance’s executive committee and a director of Global Trading, an international cashew broker.

“It is important to show that something is happening in Africa,” Blokland said.

“The visibility responds to interest that is very apparent in African cashew.”
Finding market is essential to realizing the alliance’s goal of increasing employment in the cashew industry, he added.

“Africa provides 40 percent of the world’s raw nuts but only 10 percent of the crop is processed in Africa,” he added. “We have to increase that to 30 percent to create employment.”

The increase would drive economic growth in cashew-producing countries across Africa. Cashews not only taste great – their economic impact is powerful, too.