Maize is a significant food source for much of the world’s population and represents a vehicle for vitamin and mineral deficiency intervention.
There are several industrial processes that generate a wide variety of maize products to fulfil consumers’ habits and preferences. Many products of the industrial dry maize–milling processes may also be produced locally on a small scale as well as in the home. Cornmeal ranks third as a staple food, after wheat and rice as measured by production.
Nigeria has an annual maize production in excess of 7 million metric tons. In terms of volume produced, maize is the third most important cereal grown in Nigeria after sorghum and millet.
The total land area planted to maize in Nigeria is above 2.5 million hectares with an estimated yield of about 1.4 metric tones per hectare. Maize is produced in virtually all the states in Nigeria, though some states produce more than others as a result of irrigation. Some of the states that maize is produced in large quantity in Nigeria includes Plateau, Kano, Kaduna, Sokoto, Gombe, Bauchi, Zamfara, Benue, Kogi, Nassarawa and Taraba.
Different products like corn starch, corn flakes and cornflour/meal can be produced from maize seed. This article focuses on the investment opportunity existing in the production of Cornmeal.
Cornmeal is derived from the grounded and desiccated seed of the maize seeds. It is whitish in colour and it is the second most produced and consumed flour after wheat flour, competing with rice flour in Nigeria.
This flour is eaten all over Nigeria, the different tribe has a name for it, such as Nri oka in Igbo land, Tuwon masara in Hausa, Oje-akpa in Igala, etc. It is acceptable all over though there are different ways it can be prepared for a meal but the same cornmeal.
The Food Transformation Result
Although the traditional open-air markets remain the dominant channel for Nigeria‘s retail food sales, the country‘s retail food sector has been undergoing change over the last decade with international supermarket brands entering the country; gradual improvement in the power sector, new malls being constructed according to international standard and the steady transformation of informal markets into more formal where people can work in, buy locally processed food without going through the stress of doing it themselves and modern facilities are setting new bars by providing a wide choice of shopping experiences in a modern, customer-oriented, building.
Any food that is consumed in Nigeria can be processed and packaged for local and international consumptions which cornmeal is one of such.
Food Processing And Packaging Requirements
Location of a business area, you have to consider some factors while locating your business, power supply, raw material, storage facilities, market etc and the land should be spacious.
Factory building which must be standard and in line with regulatory bodies’ specifications.
Business registration (Cooperates Affairs Commission, Nigeria Export Promotion Council, Standard Organization of Nigeria/National Food, Drug Administration and Control, Local Government etc).
Equipment (Flash dryer, packaging machines, Grinding machines, weight machines, etc), depending on the scale you want to operate.
Motor vehicles for distributions of products if possible.
Storage facility
Brand Name
Profitability
The return on this Agribusiness investment is quite attractive and impressive that prospecting investors in this venture will also feel comfortable to release their hard-earned money to finance this project because food processing business is a business with 100% return on investment in Nigeria today going by our population and improved standard of living.
With less than N1,000,000 you can comfortably start this business anywhere in Nigeria, even in your house, all you need is weighing machine, sealing machine and packaging material which will not cost you more than N200,000 depending on the scale you want to operate.
