Cocoa Production - Ghana Vs Cote d’Ivoire

In the 60s and 70s the Geography syllabus for primary, middle and secondary schools certainly had Ghana as the world-leading producer of Cocoa. In the latter part of the 80s till date, the world ranking content has been withdrawn from most of the books, and not even the politicians mention it.

Rather, we hear the politicians talk about the cocoa buying prices, and each party in government talks about their roles in the improvement of the cocoa sector compared to the opposition party. However, whatever progress is made in the cocoa production in relation to the global market is kept silence.

During the launch of the Cocoa Rehabilitation Programme, at Sefwi Wiawso on the 24th September 2020, the President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, mentioned that Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire were responsible for 65% of the raw cocoa beans used in making the world’s chocolates.

However, most of us do not know how much of that 65% is Ghana’s portion. Well, my search indicates that Cote d’Ivoire currently produces 46% of the world’s cocoa. That means Ghana is producing 19% of the world cocoa, and for now, Ghana is up as the second-largest producer of cocoa, after production fell in Indonesia a few years ago.

So what happened that Ghana fell from first to third in cocoa production at a point in time? Let us go through the milestones. Tetteh Quarshie brought the cocoa bean into the then Gold Coast from Fernando Po (now Equatorial Guinea) in 1876.

From the 1900 till the 1970s, Ghana was the leading world producer of cocoa, and it was the highest foreign exchange earner for Ghana - about 45% in the 1960s. Even until the 1990s, cocoa’s share of the country’s total export earnings averaged about 35% annually. Currently, the annual percentage share has dropped to about 25%.

Ghana’s production levels began to fall from the mid-60s, after the state Cocoa Marketing Board (today COCOBOD) lowered the prices paid to farmers for their produce. Subsequent regimes tried to rescue the fall in production, but other factors such as access to finance, corruption, and instability in governance, etc. affected the cocoa farmer, regime after regime till the 90s.

Cote d’Ivoire on the other hand passed Ghana in 1978 in cocoa production and has since remained the world-leading producer of cocoa till date. Refer to Fig 1.

So how come Cote d’Ivoire is leading and doing better than Ghana in cocoa? There are many Ghanaian authors who have written about the cocoa situation in Ghana but have hardly touched on the ‘how’ of the progress of cocoa production in Cote d’Ivoire.

Mass production of cocoa started in Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) in the 40s, and the architect of the cocoa growth in Cote d’Ivoire was their first president, Félix Houphouet-Boigny. Houphouet-Boigny’s father was a tribal chief and a wealthy cocoa farmer, and he inherited his father’s cocoa plantation at an early age, so he was well knowledgeable in its production and market. He formed the Syndicat Agricole Africain (SAA), a union that helped negotiate prices of agricultural products, and defended farmworkers and planters’ interests in French-occupied territories in the 40s-50s.

Before becoming president at independence, Houphouet-Boigny also worked in the French National Assembly, while still trading in cocoa, which helped him establish relationships with major cocoa bean buyers in Europe along the way. After attaining independence in 1960, Houphouet-Boigny encouraged French technicians to stay and help develop Cote d’Ivoire, and about 50,000 did so. Some of these French nationals were encouraged to join in the production of cocoa and other agricultural products, and for which the president offered lands for their cultivations. Refer to Fig. 2.

New techniques were adopted such as plastic cones to cover the cocoa plants during their early growth when they would be vulnerable to intense sunlight improved productivity. They adopted irrigation in the production of cocoa, and today the world’s largest irrigation scheme of cocoa is in Cote d’Ivoire.

Houphet-Boigny promoted a private sector economy in the 60s which took advantage of Cote d’Ivoire's comparative advantage in agricultural products and developed prosperous export industries in such things as coffee, mangoes, cashew, avocados, pineapples, and cocoa. Thus, apart from Cocoa, Cote d’Ivoire is a world-leading producer of cashew. Other known exports are coffee and cotton. Refer to Fig. 3.

Taxes in Cote d‘Ivoire were kept relatively low and government regulations held in check. As a consequence, economic activity migrated to Cote d’Ivoire from other regions in West Africa. Labour from neighbouring countries such as Burkina Faso, Mali, etc. migrated to work as employees to the French nationals on the cocoa farms. In the 70s and 80s, production in high tax countries such as Ghana were smuggled into Cote d’Ivoire to be marketed. Cote d’Ivoire eventually moved cocoa production from 85,000 tonnes in 1961 to 2 million tonnes in 2018.

The multinational grinders (ADM, Cargill, Barry Callebaut and Cemoi) also played significant roles in the development of the cocoa industry in Cote d’Ivoire. These grinders enjoyed low tax and low electricity tariffs. Ghana, on the other hand, adopted the free-zone scheme, later on, to attract these grinders in the 2000s, however, electricity tariffs remained high in Ghana.

Cote d’Ivoire, since the 50s adopted the mass plantation farming for most of its agriculture e.g. cocoa, cashew, rubber, banana, etc. FAO’s reports indicate that farms that are irrigated in Cote d’Ivoire is about the double of the total farmland that Ghana is irrigating.

It is obvious that Ghana went to sleep in the 60s - from the Nkrumah’s years of glory, through the military regimes to the millennium – amidst mismanagement of state businesses, corruption (missing cocoa ship scandal, etc.), political instability, low cocoa prices, late payments to farmers, smuggling of cocoa, etc. However, it is worth commending the governments under the 4th Republic for the improvements on cocoa production through the COCOBOD.

Nevertheless, the rate of growth in the production of cocoa remains lower than the growth rate of Cote d’Ivoire (refer to Fig 1). Ghana is today the 2nd leading producer of Cocoa thanks to the fall in production at Indonesia. It is the expectation that Ghana has put in place the necessary measures to sustain the growth (even if not at a faster rate), and to retain the 2nd position at least, in the next 10 years.

I chanced on an advertisement by the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre’s (GIPC) on linkedin, that is promoting the Agricultural sector (among other sectors) for investments, and I think it is a great idea. However, it is important that GIPC be mindful of the incentives prevailing in other countries in the sub-region as well as the respective competitive advantages, if we should get the Foreign Direct Investors (FDIs) to look Ghana’s way.

More efforts need to be put in by the Government of Ghana to rejuvenate the coca industry, to attract the youth into the production of cocoa. Youth unemployment is high, even in the cocoa growing regions, and therefore attracting the youth into cocoa farming resolves both the unemployment issue and helps increase the production of cocoa. To achieve this, the government through COCOBOD must:

• promote the cocoa industry as an attractive venture to the youth

• change the perception of the youth towards farming

• address the bottlenecks of:

o Access to land – chiefs to make land available

o Access to finance – tailored credit and savings schemes

• Provide training and regular support on the farms (fertilizer, spraying, etc.)

• Sustain current engagements with farmers - on global market expectations, etc.

• Fulfil government’s part of bargain on cocoa pricing, etc.

The increment of the youth in the value chain activities of cocoa (instead of the elderly) is the surest way to accelerate the production rate and to secure the future of the cocoa industry in Ghana.