Diving deep into the Mile 12 Fruits and Vegetables Market, Lagos

When you come to Mile 12 Lagos, the first thing that comes to your mind is the huge fruits and vegetables market. Daily about 500 to 1000 trucks loaded with fresh fruits, vegetables and other perishable food are off-loaded inside the market. On arri…

When you come to Mile 12 Lagos, the first thing that comes to your mind is the huge fruits and vegetables market. Daily about 500 to 1000 trucks loaded with fresh fruits, vegetables and other perishable food are off-loaded inside the market. On arrival the produce are normally sold off to the wholesalers who in turn sells to the retailers.

Farmers, retailers and wholesalers experience high rate of spoilage, during transportation and offloading. Raffia basket which is used in packaging damages most of the fresh fruits and vegetables especially the tomatoes, due to inherent stress during transportation. While offloading some of the tomatoes falls into the mud, trampled on and before it gets to the owner 10% loss have occurred.

After the day sales, the traders keep their tomatoes in the open space, covering it with leaf, but this does not stop spoilage from happening. From the farm s in the northern part of Nigeria down to the Mile 12 Market in Lagos great loss happens even before it get to the final consumer.

ColdHubs will be working with the Fresh Fruits and Vegetables Dealers Association, to reduce these loses.