Brief Product Description:

Sesame seeds are about 3 to 4 millimetres long by 2 millimetres wide and 1 millimetre thick. The seeds are ovate, slightly flattened and somewhat thinner at the eye of the seed (hilum) than at the opposite end. The weight of the seeds is between 20 and 40 milligrams. The seed coat (testa) may be smooth or ribbed. Sesame seeds come in many colours depending on the cultivar harvested. The most traded variety of sesame is off-white coloured. Other common colours are buff, tan, gold, brown, reddish, grey and black.

Types:

• Black Sesame Seeds
• White Sesame Seeds
• Hulled Sesame Seeds

Producing Areas:

• Nasarawa
• Jigawa
• Benue
• Yobe
• Taraba
• Kano
• Katsina
• Gombe
• Kogi
• Plateau
• Niger States.

Estimated production figure

572,761MT (FAO; 2018)

Quality Standard:

Purity: – 98-99.5%

Foreign matter: – 2% max

Oil content: – 45% min

Moisture: – 8% max

Packaging:

Clean Jute bag or polypropylene bag (pp) of 45-50kg

Uses:

Confectionaries, cooking oil, ingredient in cuisines, feed for poultry/livestock

Importing Countries:

• Japan
• Turkey
• Vietnam
• Brazil
• UAE
• China

Export Potential for Sesame Seed

The markets with the greatest potential for Nigeria’s exports of Sesame seeds are “China”, “Japan” and “Turkey”. Nigeria has closed export links with Morocco. China is the market with the highest demand potential for Sesame seeds.