Vegetables and fruits are a vitally important source of micronutrients, vitamins and minerals and therefore essential components of balanced and healthy diets. Yet, production and demand are still too low to provide the population in many countries in Southern Africa with the minimum per capita consumption of 400 g/person/day required for good health (FAO/WHO, 2004). In Africa, most countries do not reach even half of this minimum requirement (AmbroseOji, 2009). Of particular importance are traditional African vegetables such as amaranth, African eggplant, roselle, okra and many others that have been cultivated in African gardens for decades. These “superfoods” provide much higher amounts of provitamin A, vitamin C and several important minerals than staples and globally traded vegetables (WorldVeg, 2018). They also contain antioxidants and other health-related phytochemicals that prevent chronic diseases such as cancer and cardiovascular disease. For growers, vegetables and fruits are often more profitable per unit volume than staples and command higher profit margins and farm gate prices per unit area of production, especially when access to farmland is limited and labour is surplus (Gabre-Madhin and Hagglade, 2003), like in many rural parts of Southern Africa. As such, vegetables and fruits are great income generators and profit can be achieved on relatively small land units. Nevertheless, sustainable and market-oriented production and consumption of safe vegetables and fruits is not being achieved in many parts of Africa, including Southern Africa. The predominant staple-based diets in the region, based on maize, wheat and rice need to be diversified with vegetables and fruits to increase nutrition and income.