THE Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (ARDA) has officially reopened the fully refurbished Best Fruit Processors (BFP) plant here, marking a major state-driven push to reduce agricultural waste and capture more value from the country’s harvests. The facility, which had been idle for four years, represents a significant investment in agro-processing. It now boasts the capacity to process 100,000 kilogrammes of tomatoes into paste or an equivalent volume of fresh fruit into pulp concentrate every day. In a statement, ARDA positioned the plant as a critical engine for rural development and a direct response to the government’s national value-addition agenda. Officials argue the revival will directly tackle chronic post-harvest losses by providing a guaranteed market for small-scale producers.
“This is not just about reopening a factory; it is about activating an entire ecosystem,” said ARDA’s director for commercial operations. “By providing a guaranteed market for processing-grade produce, we are de-risking farming, encouraging higher-value crop cultivation, and ensuring that the wealth created in rural areas is retained and multiplied there.” The plant is set to primarily source raw materials from ARDA’s network of Village Business Units (VBUs) and smallholder farmers across the country’s eight farming provinces. This integrated model aims to create a closed-loop system, where rural production directly supplies industrial processing. ARDA states the objectives are threefold: stimulate rural economies through reliable off-take agreements, provide farmers with consistent pricing, and supply domestic and regional markets with high-quality, locally manufactured food products like tomato paste and fruit concentrates. The authority further framed the Norton plant as a strategic move to reduce reliance on imported processed foods and create skilled jobs in the agro-processing sector. It is described as a direct catalyst for the “agro-industrialization” central to the government’s Vision 2030 development goals. The reopening signals a tangible step in ARDA’s strategy to use guaranteed markets as a tool for rural economic transformation, with the success of the venture now hinging on sustained production from smallholder networks and the plant’s operational efficiency.