Arabfields, Maleeka Kassou, East, West and Central Africa Agriculture Correspondent — Tanzania’s rapidly expanding cashew industry is attracting new interest from Algerian investors as the country seeks to move beyond raw nut exports and build a stronger domestic processing industry.

The latest move comes from Algerian processor Sarl Anacard’Or, which plans to establish three modern cashew processing plants in Tanzania. The first facility is expected to be developed in Masasi District, in the Mtwara region, one of the country’s main cashew producing areas.

For Walid Dib, the company’s owner and chief executive, the decision is closely linked to the quality and growing availability of Tanzanian cashews. The company is preparing to work with a local partner under the name Kilimanjaro Nuts Limited, while machinery is expected to be sourced from Vietnam.

The investment comes at a significant moment for Tanzania’s cashew sector. During the 2025/26 season, the country harvested about 617,683 tonnes of raw cashew nuts, an increase of nearly 17 percent from the previous season. The crop generated around 1.25 trillion Tanzanian shillings in value, underlining the importance of cashews to rural incomes and export earnings.

Yet the figures also reveal a major opportunity. Tanzania still processes only a fraction of its harvest locally. Domestic processors handled about 20,000 tonnes in 2025, although that represented a 67 percent increase from the previous year. The sharp rise shows that processing capacity is expanding, but it remains far below the volume of raw nuts produced by farmers.

In Mtwara, where cashew farming is central to the local economy, the arrival of new factories could therefore have an impact beyond investment figures. More processing means additional demand for local services, factory workers, transport operators and suppliers. For farmers, the development could gradually create a more stable domestic market for their harvest.

The Algerian project also illustrates the growing commercial relationship between the two countries. Anacard’Or has already been importing Tanzanian cashews for processing at its facility in Oran. The company recently reported receiving multiple containers from Tanzania, with each container carrying about 27 tonnes of nuts.

Tanzania is now targeting a much larger transformation of the sector. Authorities want production to reach one million tonnes by 2030 and have set an objective of processing at least 60 percent of the crop domestically. In 2026, the gap between these ambitions and current processing levels remains substantial, suggesting considerable room for foreign capital, technology and industrial partnerships.

If production continues to rise at the recent pace and investment projects move forward as planned, Tanzania could see a significant expansion of its processing industry over the next several years. Reaching the government’s 60 percent processing target would require factories to absorb hundreds of thousands of tonnes of raw nuts annually, creating a much larger market for machinery, logistics, packaging and skilled labour.

The outlook, however, will depend on more than new factories. Industry operators continue to point to financing constraints, technology requirements, infrastructure and administrative delays as obstacles to faster growth. Ensuring that farmers receive timely payments and that processors have reliable access to raw materials will also be essential.

For Algeria, the opportunity extends beyond securing supplies. Establishing processing capacity inside Tanzania could give Algerian companies a stronger position in an expanding African agricultural value chain, while allowing Tanzanian producers to retain a larger share of the value generated after the harvest.

The coming years will show whether these investments can help turn Tanzania from a major exporter of raw cashews into a more integrated processing hub. With production already above 600,000 tonnes and ambitious targets for the end of the decade, the direction of travel is increasingly clear: more of Tanzania’s cashew value is expected to be created at home.