Blue Skies’ Fresh Fruit Products Make Millions While Creating A Lasting Impact - Forbes

The story of Blue Skies is a story of “adding value at the source.” Consumers in developed economies may realize that their coffee is Ethiopian, that their chocolate is Ghanaian, or their cotton is Egyptian, but they may not realize that this means that only the raw material is coming from that country; the finished product is rarely produced at the source. According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, 60% of developing economies are dependent on commodities export. This is a problem because “in these regions, economic growth is strong in periods of high commodity prices and weak when the price cycle trends downward. Given that commodity prices follow cycles characterized by long episodes of low prices and relatively short episodes of high prices, economic growth in such countries follows a similar cycle.”

Blue Skies, founded in 1997 with a mission “to build together a profitable enterprise where people respect each other, care for the environment and inspire a legacy for the future,” does not fall into this pattern. They make their finished product, fresh cut fruit, fresh fruit juices, and non-dairy ice creams, where their fruit is grown. They harvest and process fruits in their 10 factories spread across Ghana, Egypt, South Africa, Benin, and Brazil, as well as the U.K. They also have pack house facilities in Senegal and the Ivory Coast. “This has created jobs in very poor communities and has encouraged adolescents to at least complete the senior high school as its one of our requirements to be of age [18yrs] before you can get an opportunity,” explained Ruth Smith-Adjei, the General Manager of West Africa for Blue Skies, and a Director of the company. Blue Skies supplies major retailers in Europe, U.K. being the primary export market, and also serves customers in Africa, a market which they are steadily expanding.

So why do so few companies process at the source? Fruit juices, cut fruits, and ice creams are simple products on the surface, but growing, processing, and exporting them is no simple feat. “It’s a high risk business with a very complicated supply chain model. We make a highly perishable product with a limited shelf life which is airfreighted on a daily basis to the supermarkets in Europe. This is done within 36 to 48 hours from harvest of fruits at its peak maturity to producing and flying to market shelves,” shared Smith-Adjei. This is hard to manage when everything goes right, but the markets where Blue Skies works add risk and volatility. Ghana’s President Akufo-Addo made headlines last year when on a State visit to Switzerland he announced that the country would no longer export raw cocoa beans and would instead produce chocolate at factories within Ghana. Ghana is responsible for 20% of the world’s supply of cocoa. But this has proven easier said than done. Forget some of the more complex supply chain issues. Ghana is a hot country and chocolate melts. The cost of electricity to keep the bars cool may challenge viability. 

Smith-Adjei was born in Ghana, but raised in Cuba. After graduating from the University of Havana, Cuba with a degree in Food Science, she returned to Ghana. She did her year of Ghana’s mandatory National Youth Service Program at the country’s Food Research Institute and then promptly joined Blue Skies as a Production Supervisor. This was 1999 and as Smith-Adjei has risen through the ranks of the company, she’s also seen the country and the market for her products change. “When Blue skies started in 1997, we had a handful of farmers into pineapple and mango. We were working with just under 15 suppliers. After 10 years, we saw tremendous growth with our farmer supplier base increasing to not less than 155,” she said. The number of farmer-suppliers the company works with has recently decreased as challenges accessing finance have thwarted the ambitions of farmers in Ghana. 

Adding-value to products before exporting them, creating jobs, and supplying the local market with healthy food products all add value at the source, but Blue Skies goes even further. The company aligns themselves to the Sustainable Develop Goals, specifically to the goals concerning Zero Poverty, Zero Biodiversity Loss, Zero Waste, and Zero Emissions. They measure and report on their progress. According to the company’s annual report, in 2020, Blue Skies increased water efficiency by 2%, employed 4000 people across 8 countries, and made 80% of its packaging with over 30% recycled content. It did all of this while generating £103M (~$143M) in gross sales. Adding value at the source has added value for its shareholders in addition to its stakeholders. 

Once this impact reporting would have made Blue Skies a major outlier, but today the private sector is increasingly focused on creating positive environmental and social returns. According to Morningstar, funds that invest according to ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) objectives more than doubled from $21B in 2019 to $51.1B in 2020. With a track record of running a company that has set the standards for ESG-smart operations in West Africa for over three decades, there is a lot to learn from leaders such as Smith-Adjei. “Most important is the respect we have for one another and all the people we come into contact with, whether it be our colleagues, our customers, our suppliers or our neighbors. Respect is the one quality which underpins all others,” she said. And when people are respected, they have more freedom and responsibility to do better work. Smith-Adjei added, “Blue Skies is not a business that expects its people to remain only confined within the boundaries of their own roles, it also encourages people to boldly step outside their comfort zones, to respectfully challenge the status quo, and to proactively try out new ideas. We do not fear failure, instead we encourage it, recognizing that failure is often the catalyst to success.”

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Blue Skies’ Fresh Fruit Products Make Millions While Creating A Lasting Impact - Forbes
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