Cocoa Floor Price: Civil Society Group Commends COCOBOD

The Ghana Civil-Society Cocoa Platform (GCCP) has called for the inclusion of strategies and mechanisms, on the agenda of the upcoming floor price implementation meeting to curb the possible imbalances in the cocoa sector.

This follows after the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) and it's counterpart in Côte d’Ivoire, Le Conseil du Cafe-Cacao had on June 12, agreed on a floor price of $2,600 per tonne of cocoa beans, and further proposed the price to buyers.

A technical meeting with stakeholders has been scheduled to take place on July 3, 2019, to fine-tune the full implementation of the floor price on the global cocoa market.

Whiles commending COCOBOD, a statement issued by the Civil-Society Organization on Thursday said attempts to regulate market forces typically end up failing, and sometimes creating worse conditions, in the long run, hence the reason for their suggestion.

"We acknowledge the various processes that yielded the results including the initial engagements between the government of Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire that has deepened cooperation between the two regulators, COCOBOD and CCC. Our greatest joy in this milestone is to see a direct and obvious change in the farm gate price of cocoa beans, such that farmers income and living standards will improve..." the statement read.

The Ghana Civil-Society Cocoa Platform further called on the international cocoa sector to support the two countries (Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire) to push for the implementation of the floor price.

"More importantly we call on our brothers and sisters from civil society in other cocoa producing countries to stand in solidarity with us and ask that governments should support this minimum price for all cocoa farmers," they added.

They are of the belief that the upcoming technical meeting with stakeholders would prove that "farmers are at the center of this initiative and must benefit as such."