{"id":26523,"date":"2025-06-24T19:03:38","date_gmt":"2025-06-24T17:03:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/resources\/\/resources\/fairfood.org\/resources\/?p=26523"},"modified":"2025-07-09T11:26:37","modified_gmt":"2025-07-09T09:26:37","slug":"fairfood-and-sommalife-on-a-mission-to-improve-shea-sustainability","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fairfood.wpdev.go2people.nl\/en\/resources\/fairfood-and-sommalife-on-a-mission-to-improve-shea-sustainability\/","title":{"rendered":"On a mission to improve shea sustainability with Sommalife"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Fairfood and Sommalife on a mission to improve shea sustainability<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019re thrilled to announce our new partnership between <\/em>Fairfood<\/em><\/strong>, <\/em>Sommalife and Solidaridad West Africa<\/em><\/strong>. Together, we\u2019re kicking off a 3-year project in <\/em>Ghana<\/em><\/strong> to strengthen the position of shea producers\u2014starting with a deep dive into <\/em>incomes<\/em><\/strong>, <\/em>child labour risks<\/em><\/strong>, and <\/em>environmental practices<\/em><\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

How much should a shea nut collector earn? <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s not a question you usually see popping up. Highly traded commodities like coffee, cocoa, or palm oil often take the spotlight, especially after last year\u2019s price surges. Those peaks, however, uncovered just the tip of a much larger iceberg: shifting climate realities and trade dynamics are reshaping global supply chains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take shea: as cocoa butter grew more expensive, companies turned to shea butter as an alternative. Add an export ban in Burkina Faso, a key country producer, and shea nut prices doubled almost overnight. A stark reminder of just how interconnected\u2013and fragile\u2013our global trading systems are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like in other commodity sectors, this price spike briefly benefited producers. But with prices now declining, those gains\u2014and the communities behind them\u2014are once again under threat. That\u2019s why we\u2019re excited to announce a new partnership with Sommalife<\/strong>, an agritech company leveraging their traceability software (TreeSyt) to make shea value chains more equitable and sustainable in West Africa. Together, we\u2019re launching a 3-year project in Ghana to better understand and improve conditions for shea producers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s happening in Ghana\u2019s shea sector?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Ghana is one of the largest producers of shea nuts globally and plays a vital role in the regional and international shea trade. This wild fruit is a key source of income for smallholders in both Ghana and Burkina Faso, and the sector is largely informal and powered by women, who do most of the collection and processing\u2013yet receive only a small fraction of the final value. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For many, shea is both a source of income and<\/em> a cultural asset. But without stronger protections and incentives, women shea collectors remain vulnerable to price fluctuations, poor working conditions, and environmental degradation. This project seeks to change that by generating contextual data, building local capacity, and working toward better market access and income security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This partnership builds on Sommalife\u2019s deep-rooted network of farmers and its commitment to sustainable value chains. Fairfood brings in its Living Income Commodity Strategy<\/a> to enhance impact measurement, using a framework designed to help public and private actors monitor impact through an income lens. With living income pricing and cost-yield efficiency data in hand, we\u2019ll dig into some of the sector\u2019s most urgent challenges: <\/p>\n\n\n\n