Following advice and hands-on, technical and practical support from Technoserve (TNS), Antonio Miranda, a Mozambican businessman, invested $160,000 in a processing plant and adjoining overgrown cashew plantation in the northern coastal district of Mogincual. Miranda himself contributed $100,000 and the remainder was short-term loan financed.

The core of the business is a simple but effective manual cashew processing technology developed jointly by Miranda and TNS technical assistance. It is based on technology currently used in Kerala, India, the world leader in cashew processing, but specially adapted for Mozambican conditions. Compared to currently prevailing Mozambican mechanical processing technologies, the Miranda/TNS method is significantly cheaper and offers superior quality and high economic returns.

The pilot plant has operated for four months with highly satisfactory results in terms of nut yields, quality, and profitability. This year's operations generated revenues of $85,000 and profits of $26,000. All production was sold at premium prices for the European market due to high quality of the product. The buyer has committed to purchasing harvest from the 2002/03 season and has furthermore committed $150,000 of loan capital, based on satisfactory performance; the loan can be expanded to $250,000 in the following years.

This capital commitment by the buyer is significant because over the next three years Miranda is looking to expand to a total of three larger-scale processing plants, placed in close proximity to each other in the heart of the Nampula cashew growing area. A facility to extract valuable cashew nut shell liquid from discarded shells would supplement these plants.

The company has received an extremely enthusiastic reception, both from the local community and from the regional authorities. It has created over 80 full time jobs and paid out $30,000 to rural farmers for raw cashew nuts. The planned expansion program would generate 900 jobs, and pay out over $2.5 million annually to the rural producers by the end of 2005.