Nigeria Palm Wine Tappers Face Tough Climb to Success

Nsukka. The pay is low and the work involves
scaling a 50-foot tree multiple times a day
with no safety net, so it is not surprising that
Nigerian palm wine tappers are struggling to
find fresh recruits.
“No newcomers,” said Anthony Ozioko, a slight
63-year-old, visibly drained after a mid-
morning climb up a palm tree in the
southeastern town of Nsukka.
Nigerians have been drinking the sap from
raffia trees, a species of palm, since long
before the country existed.
Palm wine was once the region’s main social
drink, an almost mandatory offer at events
such as weddings and concerts, although the
proliferation of beer and foreign liquor has in
part curbed the demand for the more
traditional drink.
Consumed straight from the tree, palm wine is
a non-alcoholic drink and said by some to have
medicinal qualities, especially for the digestive
system.
When fermented and distilled, palm sap
produces a drink that recalls a bottle of Sprite,
but with much less sugar and about as boozy
as a standard bottle of beer.
Experts say the consumer demand for palm
wine is strong, but production is struggling
amid a decades-long agriculture sector decline
in Nigeria, where the oil industry, Africa’s
largest, has become dominant.
Attempts to develop the palm wine sector have
mostly floundered and the business largely
remains as rudimentary as ever: tappers climb
the tree, process the sap and deliver it directly
to a customer, typically someone who lives
nearby.
For young Nigerians the work seems to have
little appeal.
“I don’t want [my son] to be a tapper. I want
him to be a pilot,” said Sabimus Nwudo as his
neighbor Ozioko described the grueling work
and marginal profits.
When a tree is ready to be harvested, the first
task is “to make the road” by using a machete
to cut divots up the trunk, which serve as slots
for both feet and a locally made climbing aid
that resembles a harness, Ozioko explained.
His climb looked daunting but he moved
quickly, wedging his harness and feet in the
pre-cut divots, eventually securing himself at
the top of the trunk, where he collected the
sap that had dripped overnight into a bottle
attached to the trunk.
Ozioko’s expert movements made the work
look deceptively safe but serious injuries and
some deaths have occurred, locals said.
Put simply, “if you don’t know how to climb it,
you’ll fall”, said the tapper, resting on a chair
after removing a few bees from his latest haul
and gulping down a cup.
The industry is still “in its cradle” and has so
far failed to attract any meaningful investment,
said Isona Gold of the Nigerian Institute for
Oil Palm Research (NIFOR).
Gold said he sees huge opportunities for
growth but his vision for better organization
and higher profits for tappers has stalled.
The plan calls for the formation of clusters of
10 tappers, each harvesting 150 liters of palm
wine per day, with a series of local processing
plants selling a bottled product — alcoholic or
not — to vendors.
The NIFOR plan estimates each tapper earning
120,000 naira ($750 or 570 euros) per month.
If successful, “the young generation may want
to go in”, Gold said.
The key is private sector involvement, he
added, but so far investors “have not indicated
much interest.”
As a niche product, and one that arguably
involves an acquired taste, palm wine’s appeal
to prospective investors is limited.
But the lack of infrastructure speaks of a
larger problem that has plagued Nigeria’s
entire agricultural sector, which analysts say
has suffered from a woeful lack of investment,
both private and public, despite being the
country’s top employment sector.
Nigeria, with its estimated 167 million people,
was the world’s largest rice importer in 2012,
according to the US Department of Agriculture,
bringing in 3.4 million tons despite having the
climate and land suitable for large-scale rice
production.
Economists have pointed to massive rice
imports to highlight the decay of Nigeria’s
agriculture sector.
While NIFOR and the government’s Institute of
Industrial Research are currently running pilot
projects that seek to make the palm wine
industry more profitable, Ozioko’s business
remains a one-man shop.
He aims to sell about 3.7 liters to a local
market each day, earning about $9.30.
That income is still well above the national
average in a country where most live on less
that $2 per day.
Ozioko also sets aside some of his harvest for
personal use.
When asked, he said he drinks palm wine every
day and offered a simple justification.
Because “I’m a tapper,” he said.