Reducing Post-Harvest Food Losses in Cameroon: A FAO Priority
- Inelle Makamwe
- 3 days ago
- 3 min read
FAO highlights that post-harvest food loss in Cameroon is due to storage and infrastructure challenges, but innovative solutions could significantly improve food availability and farmer incomes.
Context
The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and its partners have made the reduction of post-harvest food losses a strategic priority for Sub-Saharan Africa under the Food Coalition initiative (regional programme 2025–2026). The figures are striking: Sub-Saharan Africa records the highest food loss rate in the world at 23%, compared to 10% in North America and Europe. This includes losses of 15–50% for cereals during storage and 25–40% for fruits and vegetables, largely due to their perishability and the lack of cold storage infrastructure.
Cameroon, often referred to as “Africa in miniature” due to its diverse ecosystems and agricultural potential, is nonetheless affected by significant post-harvest losses. These losses reduce farmers’ incomes, increase food prices, and worsen nutritional insecurity. The causes are multiple and interconnected:
Weak infrastructure: lack of functional cold chains in most rural areas and poor road networks limiting access to markets
Inadequate storage systems: limited use of hermetic bags or metal silos; traditional storage methods are exposed to pests and humidity
Insufficient local processing: perishable products (tomatoes, plantains, tubers) spoil before reaching the market due to a lack of processing facilities
Limited market access: smallholder farmers, especially in remote regions (East, Adamawa, Far North), struggle to sell produce before spoilage
Conflict and insecurity: in the North-West and South-West regions, cultivated land has decreased by 20–40%, with conflict-related losses adding to post-harvest losses
FAO Proposed Solutions
Within its Food Coalition (Pillar 4: Sustainable Solutions, 2025–2026), FAO is testing and scaling practical, context-specific solutions to reduce post-harvest losses across priority value chains in Sub-Saharan Africa. These include:
Hermetic storage bags (grain bags): airtight storage systems that eliminate insects and mould without chemicals, reducing cereal losses by 40–80%
Solar-powered cold rooms: off-grid cooling systems that preserve fruits, vegetables, and dairy products for up to 21 days
Digital farmer–buyer platforms: mobile systems that connect farmers directly with buyers, restaurants, and school feeding programmes to reduce spoilage
Post-harvest training: capacity building for cooperatives on handling, drying, packaging, and marketing of agricultural products
What does this mean for Cameroon?
Post-harvest losses represent a major challenge for Cameroon and Sub-Saharan Africa as a whole, where 30–50% of harvested crops can be lost before consumption. These losses directly reduce farmers’ incomes, worsen food insecurity, and limit access to diverse and nutritious diets. In Cameroon, where more than 3.3 million people are already food insecure, reducing agricultural losses represents a strategic opportunity to improve national food availability.
Simple and affordable solutions such as hermetic bags, metal silos, and solar cold storage could significantly reduce losses in cereals, fruits, and vegetables. A reduction of just 20% in maize and cassava losses could add hundreds of thousands of tonnes of food to the national market. These innovations would also improve smallholder farmers’ access to urban markets and school feeding programmes while increasing their incomes.
Beyond economic impact, better food preservation would help maintain the nutritional quality of fresh foods, particularly essential vitamins and micronutrients. Reducing post-harvest losses is also an important environmental issue, as food waste contributes significantly to global greenhouse gas emissions and the unnecessary use of water and land resources.
Finally, although Cameroon does not yet have a fully structured national policy on post-harvest losses, initiatives such as CONVERGEFOOD provide an important opportunity to integrate this issue into future agricultural and food system strategies.
References
FAO. Food Loss and Waste in Selected African Countries — Food Coalition Pillar 4. 2025–2026. https://www.fao.org/food-coalition/activities/ongoing-activities/food-loss-and-waste-in-selected-african-countries/en
FAO SDG Portal. Indicator 12.3.1 — Global Food Losses 2023. https://www.fao.org/sustainable-development-goals-data-portal/data/indicators/1231-global-food-losses/en
Swai H. et al. From farm to fork: strategies for sustainable reduction of post-harvest losses in Sub-Saharan Africa. 2025. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23311932.2025.2588851
Aragie E. et al. Does reducing food losses and wastes in sub-Saharan Africa make economic sense? 2018. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5555439/
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