Economic evaluation of a locally fabricated extraction machine for a cottage cashew juice factory.

The need for local utilisation of agricultural procedure cannot be over-emphasised. Agricultural commodities are shifting from exploitation in their primary to processed forms. Cashew apple, a product of the fruit of cashew tree and a by-product of cashew nut harvest, is presently under-utilised in Nigeria. There is so much wastage of this fresh apple on farms since a negligible portion is consumed by the harvesters. Work has been on for some time now at CRIN to harness this wastage into commercially viable human foods or food ingredients. Much progress has been made to-date on the production of juice from the apple. This study assesses the cottage utilisation of the apple using a locally fabricated extraction machine. The economic analysis of the investment indicated that it is highly profitable with a profitability of 66.19% and a net present value of N453, 283.21(US$4533) over three years, even under a short cashew harvesting period of three months. From these results, it was recommended that cashew farmer groups and co-operatives should be supported through credit facilities under the small-scale enterprise scheme to adopt this technology.