Economic case for exporting Nigerian food (1)

I would like to crave readers’ indulgence to introduce upfront the three motivating factors for this article. These are the recent ban on export of some Nigerian food items to Europe by the European Union, which has negative implications for non-oil export earnings; the fact that Nigeria has refrained from signing off on the slavish Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA), a situation our former slave masters consider offensive; and the dramatic crash in the international price of oil/gas, which has put the Nigerian economy on the verge of recession and highlighted the need for the country to expand its foreign exchange base to agriculture and food export trade.

Records have it that about 45 million African Americans live in the United States of America. That is about 14 percent of the population of the biggest economy in the world, and with African American purchasing power of about $1 trillion, the largeness of the market for yams, fufu, cassava, garri and palm oil plus African soup condiments like pepper, okra, melon seed, etc cannot be over-emphasized. If you add the equally burgeoning size of Africans in Canada to the number in the USA, then you see a potential ‘goldmine’ in food export business waiting to be tapped.

Beyond the Americas, Africans also abound in reasonable population size in the Caribbean and therefore present a veritable market for Nigerian food export too. Europe is another remarkable home to a large chunk of African population due to colonial affinity and therefore a vital market. The European market attractiveness is reflected particularly in the UK where Nigerians of mixed parentage have risen to the top echelon of the political architecture, amongst whom is George Umunna, a member of the shadow parliament who recently narrowly missed being elected chairman of the Labour Party.

The critical mass of Africans present in Europe estimated by the BBC to be about 4.6 million in 2007 (Immigration Policy Institute actually believes they are about 7-8 million) is in part due to the close proximity of the two continents and of course owing to the fact that Europe colonized Africa over a long period of time after the deal to partition Africa amongst European countries was sealed during the Berlin Conference of 1822. At that time, Europe and the rest of the advanced societies needed Africa’s natural resources and manpower to grow their economies and they had to devise a hook or crook method of having their way. Some pundits would argue that the slave traders connived with willing African chiefs to ignite inter-tribal wars that led to capturing of our progenitors for enslavement and conversion into forced labourers in plantations in Europe and then Newfoundland, now USA.

Over the years and with the advent, in the 1930s, of industrial revolution in Europe, which entails less reliance on man and more on machine, the Africans who had been drawn by forces of demand and supply into the labour force remained in Europe, having been assimilated, and thus began raising families which boosted African population over there. Although these Africans in the diaspora have broadly imbibed western cultures such as European and American lifestyles, their craving for African identity as reflected in African food has been undying. That demand has remained largely unmet as there has not been any conscious effort by Nigerian authorities or the private sector to promote Nigerian food abroad.

The Chinese introduced Chinese food restaurants and the rest of Asia presented noodles to the world; the Italians made pizza popular globally and the English are famous for fish and chips while the French are renowned for the French toast and cheese, just as nobody can ignore American burgers. Apart from the western world, the Indians have put their curry on the global stage and Lebanese food, especially humus and sharwarma from the Arab stable, are widely accepted as snacks internationally. For lack of a better nomenclature, I would like to refer to the introduction of foods from the different countries and races catalogued above into the global palette as the food race – mimicking human race. At this juncture, the question that would agitate the mind of any keen reader is: where is Africa in the food race and, indeed, where is Nigeria?

According to HORIZON 2020 (an EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation), Benin Republic, Cameroun, Egypt, Madagascar, Senegal, Ghana and South Africa are collaborating with AFTER (African Food Tradition Revisited by Research) to improve 10 foods and drinks from Africa based on local knowledge in Europe. Unlike the aforementioned countries, Nigeria, the acclaimed giant of Africa, has not officially done much to extend some of its exciting food and drinks ensemble to its diaspora population.

Yes, there have been private sector efforts in trying to extend Nigerian cuisine overseas, which can’t be discountenanced because I’m aware of efforts made by some local food retailers like Sweet Sensation, Mama Cass and Tastee to establish restaurants in London, but the concept has not flourished. Nevertheless, when you visit most cities in the world, you would almost certainly find a Nigerian kitchen (as opposed to highbrow restaurants) serving piping hot fufu, amala, tuwo with bitter leaf, ewedu and mia kuka soups. In Washington DC, for instance, there is an area called Adams Morgan featuring a long array of restaurants serving African cuisines, including Nigerian. From Maryland, Atlanta, Houston to Miami and Los Angeles, Nigerian restaurants abound but usually not in organized fashion like the Chinese, English or Indian.

On one occasion when I was staying in Beverly Hills hotel in Los Angeles, my friends and I ordered Nigerian meals from one of the many ‘bukaterias’ in the city. Jollof rice, semovita, okra soup, dodo (fried plantain) and moi-moi (bean pudding) were on the menu that was brought to us by a Nigerian food entrepreneur. While we were busy dishing for ourselves, one of our white guests unknowingly dished some jollof rice, a bit of semovita, moi-moi and dodo into his plate. Before we knew it, he had a mouthful of a combination of the food he picked and commented that it was delicious before I promptly informed him that the combination was wrong. Perhaps he was being gratuitous or polite hence his complimentary comment, but the point is that a white foreigner was willing to give Nigerian food a try and he seemed to have liked it.

Magnus Onyibe