Grown in Ghana, Made in Ghana: Adding Value to Cashew

Mildred Akotia remembers the snack cart 

She was somewhere over the Atlantic, on one of her many international trips, when a cart was pushed down the aisle. Nuts from different parts of the world. She looked through everything on offer and found, as she always did, nothing from Ghana, a country that grows some of the finest cashew.  Cashew that had likely passed through Ghanaian hands, been loaded into a sack, and shipped to a processing facility outside the shores of Ghana, where other hands processed it, branded it, and put it on this cart.  

By the time her flight landed, she had conceived the idea of changing the narrative.  She will start her own company named Akwaaba Fine Foods. That was 2015. More than a decade later, in July 2026, Mildred Akotia launched three new cashew products she had developed: Cocoa Dusted Milk Chocolate Cashews, Cashew Energy Bar, and Cashew Fonio Granola.   

Mildred’s story is part of a broader picture. Across other launches in Accra in July 2026, two Ghanaian agro processing businesses: Flexy Foods, and JGrand Commodities brought nine new cashew products to the market, each certified by the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA). 

A Programme Built for Exactly This Moment 

Behind the nine products is a deliberate, Africa-wide push to change the economics of cashew. One of the core activities of the GIZ Market Oriented Value Chains for Jobs and Growth in the ECOWAS Region (MOVE) project is the New Product Development (NPD): a structured programme that walks private sector processors through the full journey from market ideas to finished product. The initiative provides hands-on technical support to small and medium-scale processors. The support includes recipe development and packaging, prototypes and sample formulation, sampling consumer feedback, and navigating certification requirements that separate a good product from a marketable one. 

In West Africa, the NPD has supported 45 private sector processors to turn market opportunities into innovative products. 102 new products have been developed to date. Of the 45 businesses supported, 37 are women-led. In Ghana, eight businesses have been supported under the NPD initiative.   

“These initiatives increase competitiveness in the cashew sector and create new employment opportunities, especially for women. This is one of GIZ’s priority areas when talking about sustainable development in Ghana,” says Sandra Retzer, Country Director, GIZ Ghana.  

The Snack That Never Made the Flight 

When Mildred Akotia founded Akwaaba Fine Foods in 2015, she had one mission: to put Ghanaian cashew flavors on the global culinary map. After steady progress, her roasted cashews and peanuts are now stocked in Shoprite, Maxmart, The Farmers Market, and in duty-free shops in Terminal 3 at the Kotoka International Airport. Her products can also be found on Delta Airlines and United Airlines.  

But reaching the flight is not the destination. With support from the NPD initiative, Akwaaba Fine Foods has further developed three new products that had hitherto been imported unto the Ghanaian shelves. 

For these innovations to succeed, creating the products is only one part of the equation. They must also be accessible to consumers. Promoting local consumption therefore goes hand in hand with making locally produced cashew products readily available on the Ghanaian market.   

“The mission is to create value for locally grown ingredients by transforming them into packaged products of world class quality that can compete with products on any international shelf,” says Mildred Akotia   

For Beate Weiskopf, Programme Manager for MOVE, creating opportunities for women is central. " We support small and medium sized enterprises, most of them lead by women, in developing innovative, market-driven products that respond to consumer preferences and create employment. As markets evolve, competitiveness increasingly depends on a company's ability to innovate.”  

This is particularly relevant to Ghana's cashew sector, where the opportunity is not only to produce more cashew, but to create a wider domestic market for products made from it. Making these products available to Ghanaian consumers gives local processors an opportunity to build demand at home while creating value from a crop grown here. 

The Fruit the World Throws Away 

Here is something most people do not know. The cashew nut is not the only valuable part. The nut grows at the base of a fleshy, pear-shaped cashew apple which is sweet, tangy, packed with Vitamin C, and almost entirely discarded in commercial processing. But unprocessed, it perishes too quickly to survive a supply chain.   

Lucy Afari, founder of Flexy Foods, looked at it differently. Established in 2017, the company focused on cashew and cocoa processing. With support from the NPD initiative, the company developed three products that put both broken cashew pieces and the cashew apple to productive use - a cashew chocolate spread, cashew brittles and a cashew apple and nut brittle (which combines dehydrated cashew apple with broken cashew nuts).  

Nothing Wasted 

Justice Kudzo Ganaku started JGrand Commodities in 2020 with a belief he has never been shy about stating: "Ghana shouldn't just grow world-class cashews. We should build world-class brands from them."  

Operating under the Juki Nuts brand, the company grew overtime, 80 retail outlets, supplying stores, gyms, shell shops, and duty-free counters. But it was a question asked on the factory floor that led to the MOVE supported product line: what happens to the broken cashew pieces left behind after sorting?   

This led to MOVE’s technical and financial support which contributed to the development of new products such as cashew milk, cashew spread and a cashew protein bar. Dubbed "Nothing Wasted,” it was a new approach in which every part of the cashew finds a purpose.  

Quality Is Not Negotiable 

These launches demonstrate that locally made products can adhere to quality standards and have a strong market appeal. Every product that went to the market passed through a rigorous process.   

The push for value addition aligns with Ghana's regulatory vision for the future of the cashew industry. Tree Crops Development Authority (TCDA) is the body that regulates and develops Ghana's tree crop sector and has been heavily invested in the NPD process. TCDA's position has been clear: Ghana's cashew sector must move beyond raw exports toward local processing, product diversification, and market development.   

"The launch of these new products demonstrate the power of innovation, value addition, and partnership in transforming locally produced agricultural commodities into competitive market products."- Adams Buabeng, Cashew Value Chain Specialist, TCDA. 

For Sandra Retzer, Country Director of GIZ Ghana, value addition strengthens industries, create employment, and improve incomes.   

“These initiatives create new opportunities for farmers, processors, retailers, and consumers. They also demonstrate that adding value to locally grown crops can strengthen industries, create employment, and improve incomes and this is one of GIZ priority areas when talking sustainable development in Ghana. Through efforts like these, more than 5,500 young people have become employed in recent years.” 

Making “Made in Ghana” Possible  

The farmers, processors, and consumers know and feel the implications of exporting raw cashew nuts. What Mildred, Justice, and Lucy launched in July 2026 is a testament to the fact that Ghana can add value to its cashews and offer different possibilities. The cashew apple does not have to rot, the broken pieces have value, and a Ghanaian snack belongs on an international flight with a market created for it here at home. 

None of it is possible without partnership between the public and private sectors and regulatory agencies. The German government and European Union will continue to partner with the private sector to make Ghana’s cashew sector truly competitive. 

Author: Adiza Yesseh