2.5 million

The National Cashew Institute (INAJU), in the northern Mozambican province of Nampula, in the current campaign has sprayed 2.5 million cashew trees against mildew and other pests.Speaking at a press conference in Nampula city, the INCAJU provincial delegate, Jaime Chissico, said that this was only 15 per cent of the 14 million trees in the province. Because of the lack of funds to buy more chemicals, it was not possible to spray all the cashew trees.Given this situation, Chissico urged cashew producers to use other, cheaper forms of treatment, such as cleaning and pruning their trees by hand.Chissico said that in this campaign Nampula expects to market about 45,000 tonnes of cashew nuts. Most of these nuts will be sold to the local cashew processing factories.In the 2015-2016 campaign, Nampula, the largest cashew producing province in the country marketed 44,000 tonnes of nuts. So Chissico was expecting an increase of around three per cent in production this campaign.There are now 13 cashew processing factories in Nampula, but only 11 of them are functioning.