World Bank Invests U.S.$300 Million in Ghana Cocoa Industry

The World Bank is set to invest $300 million in Ghana's cocoa industry to shore up production of the crop over the next five years, a Senior World Bank Agricultural Economist, Amos Gyau has announced.

Under the Cocoa Sector Value Chain Project, the initiative is to increase productivity levels of cocoa farmers as well as promote value addition.

Gyau explained that the government had approached the World Bank to support the country to increase her cocoa production and thus the World Bank and government as well as Cocoa Board was discussing the modalities of the project.

He said the objective of the project was to help farmers increase their production levels from the current 300 kilogrammes per hectare to two tonnes per hectare over the period.

"The World Bank seeks to support the cocoa sector to double productivity in the next five years," he said, through the provision of better seedlings and inputs to farmers, hand pollination and educating farmers on best agronomic practices.

Dr Gyau also intimated that the annual value of the world cocoa trade amounted to about $9 billion and only 7 per cent got to the cocoa producing countries because the cocoa produce was exported in its raw state to the world market, saying it was to reverse that the World Bank intends to finance the Cocoa Value Chain Project.

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Challenges facing Ghana's cocoa sector

An analyst has called for the firing of the chief executive of the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) on the grounds that the important sector's fortunes have been declining under his watch.


“Consistently, cocoa has been under-performing and there is no reason why we should keep him there,” said
Sydney Casely-Hayford about Stephen Kwabena Opuni.

'Under his leadership, the cocoa sector which is the leading foreign exchange earner for the country has suffered major setbacks,' says a media report.

Amongst the sector's many challenges: Inadequate rainfall, lack of pesticides and fertilizers for farmers, the depreciation of the cedi (1 U.S. $ = 3.75 Ghana Cedi, 09 August 2015 rate) increased smuggling of cocoa beans, delayed resource allocation, the reduction of government spraying programme, among others have adversely affected the sector.

At the beginning of the 2014/2015 cocoa season, COCOBOD projected a target yield of 1 million tonnes; a projection many industry players described as over ambitious. The International Cocoa Organization (ICCO) subsequently dropped Ghana’s yield for the 2014/2015 crop season by about 20% from some 900,000 tonnes to about 700,000 tonnes.

African Agriculture

Cameroon's 2014/15 cocoa production up 10% over 2013/14

Cameroon's 2014/15 cocoa production increased to 232,530 tonnes compared with 209,905 tonnes the previous season, National Cocoa and Coffee Board (NCCB) data released on August 6 showed.

Cocoa bean exports from the world's sixth biggest grower rose to 198,129 tonnes by the end of the season on July 15, an increase of 23,500 tonnes or nearly 12 percent from 2013/14 levels, according to the marketing board's statement.

The NCCB did not give a comparative total figure for 2013/14 exports. The board announced exports of 158,000 tonnes at the end of last season. The statement released on Thursday, which marked the start of the 2015/16 season, did not explain the discrepancy.

The Netherlands was the top destination for exports, receiving over 73 percent of Cameroon's beans, the data showed, followed by Belgium at just over 8 percent and Indonesia at nearly 8 percent.

Meanwhile Cameroon processed 32,143 tonnes of cocoa domestically during the 2014/15 season, the NCCB said. Industrial grinders Sic-Cacaos, a subsidiary of Swiss chocolate manufacturing firm Barry Callebaut, and CHOCOCAM, an affiliate of South Africa's Tiger Brands accounted for 32,112 tonnes. The remaining 31 tonnes were processed by artisanal units. That compares with a total of 32,804 tonnes processed in 2013/14, according to figures announced by the NCCB at the end of that season.

In March, Cameroon announced plans to double its cocoa processing capacity to about 30 percent of its total production, or nearly 70,000 tonnes of beans per year, by adding 10 new processing units.


The nation's cocoa season runs from August to July. The main harvest is from October to January/February, followed by a light crop harvest period from April/May to June/July.

Reuters

Agri-value chain certification schemes may not quite deliver what they suggest

Certification schemes have in recent years been very successful at creating a niche for themselves in the value chains for various products. Amongst the best known are the ISO, Globalgap, the Rainforest Alliance, Fairtrade and various 'organic' certification schemes.

Each promises to deliver various socio-economic standards for the cultivating and sourcing of raw materials to producers, consumers and many others in between. While the business insiders in the sectors 'governed' by each of these certification schemes may know the details of what is verified and given the stamp of approval, most of the general public have only a hazy idea. But especially for some consumers in western countries, a product's seal of approval by one or more of these certification schemes suggests that the product is produced according to 'ethical' standards.

Among the assumed implications of what 'ethical' means are that no child labour is used (e.g. cocoa) or that farmers are paid 'fair' prices for their crops (fair trade).

But it turns out that the certification stamps may not quite mean what much of the public (western consumers mostly) assumes.

 For instance, it has recently come out that manufacturers of products containing cocoa as a key ingredient need only source 30% of the cocoa according to the Rainforest Alliance's criteria before they can use the scheme's logo as a marketing tool for the products.

To charges of misleading consumers about what it means for a product to carry a Rainforest Alliance-approved logo, the organization rather weakly protests that the acceptance of the 30% certified cocoa practice is based on a commitment by the maker of the product to up the proportion to 100% certified cocoa within five years (negotiable.)

It is understandable that a one-size-fits-all certification regime may not be practical in the case of a product like cocoa, grown and sourced in vastly differing agricultural and economic conditions across the world. But  there probably are many consumers who might feel that 30% is less than what the average person would think as an acceptable minimum requirement (certified cocoa content) for that finished product (chocolate, etc) to be able to carry the RA alliance.

Further complicating matters, certified cocoa can be mixed with uncertified (or differently certified) cocoa at several places in the value chain, meaning that 'certification' of the final product with which the cocoa will be  made can mean almost anything.

The standards for a product to win 'Fairtrade' certification are apparently higher than those of the Rainforest Alliance, but Fairtrade-certified cocoa can be mixed with non-Fairtrade cocoa before the final (certified) product's manufacture. The reasons given for this are the complicated logistics and high costs of keeping certified and non-certified coca separate. That is understood, but it also means that a 'Fairtrade' logo on a product may actually mean much less than the average consumer may think it does.

Despite all this confusion, the certification schemes partly defend themselves by stating that participant farmers are still better off than farmers who are not members, those who are totally at the whim of global supply and demand pricing.

Apart from these controversies, there have long been critics who allege that some certification schemes are merely a type of white-washing of the unfair-to-small-farmers practices of global corporates like those that dominate the cocoa/chocolate sector.

African Agriculture

Nigerian cocoa output forecast to go up by 20 percent in 2012/13 season

by Vincent Nwanma

Cocoa output from Nigeria, the world’s fourth-biggest producer, may rise by as much as 20 percent in the season that started on October 1 as new farms begin production, an industry group said.

Cocoa trees planted four to five years ago in western, eastern and midwestern regions of Nigeria will begin to bear fruits in the 2012-13 season and raise the country’s output to at least 300,000 metric tons
from 250,000 tons last year, Robo Adhuze, spokesman for the Cocoa Association of Nigeria, said by phone today in Akure in the southwestern state of Ondo.

“In the past five years, Nigeria has done so much to raise output, and what we are seeing now is the result of that,” Adhuze said. The government encouraged farmers to expand their farms, replace old trees
and also taught them good practices, he said. Last year, eight new varieties of cocoa, with shorter maturity periods and higher yields per hectare, were introduced, he said.

Ondo state, the biggest producer, is expected to increase output to 90,000 tons from less than 77,000 tons last year, Adhuze said, adding production should also rise in Cross River and Edo.


Flooding in parts of Nigeria including Kogi, Edo and Cross River states is causing “anxiety” among the farmers, Adhuze said. “It means that output of cocoa from these states could be affected,” he said.

Flooding worsened after gates on hydro electric dams on the country’s biggest river, the Niger, were opened to prevent them from collapsing under pressure from “high-intensity rains,” said Anthony Anuforo, director-general of the Nigerian Meteorological Agency.

Nigeria ranks behind the Ivory Coast, Ghana and Indonesia in cocoa production, according to the International Cocoa Organization. Shipments of the beans represent the second- biggest foreign exchange earner for Nigeria, Africa’s leading oil producer, according to government figures. 


Nigeria’s cocoa year is divided into two harvests with the main one beginning in October and ending in January, while the smaller crop usually begins in March and ends in June.

Bloomberg

Ghana: cocoa drip irrigation to combat dry conditions?

 Cocoa is an important crop to the Ghanaian economy, but changing weather patterns that threaten reliable yields are a worry.

Tony Fofie, chief executive officer of the Ghana Cocoa Board, has suggested that drip irrigation is being considered as a recourse, to reduce dependence on rain..

 “The rainfall patterns have actually changed, we risk losing cocoa in periods of drought. We are looking at sinking boreholes within very large farms where we can have drip irrigation for the plants,” he said.

Cocoa production for 2012/13 is forecast at 800,000 tonnes compared to the previous season's all-time high of more than a million tonnes. The drop is partly attributed to less favourable rain.

Most of Ghana's cocoa is produce by scattered small holder farmers, rather than on the kind of large plantations on which irrigation might be consistently possible. It would neither be quick or easy for drip irrigation to be a realistic resort for most farmers.

African Agriculture

Cameroon 2011/12 cocoa harvest was 210,034 tonnes

That was a little lower than the record 240,000 tonnes of 2010/11.

Companies from The Netherlands bought 180,075 tonnes, or 70%, of this year’s exports. Germany was the distant second biggest importer of Cameroonian cocoa, buying 7% of the total quantity exported.

More…

Nigeria: new cocoa variety, ambitious sector expansion plans

The Nigerian minister of agriculture farmers in the country's states that produces cocoa will soon benefit from the distribution of a much improved variety, as part of the government's efforts to kick start several sectors of the oil-producing country's long-neglected agriculture.

Akinwunmi Adesina said the new cocoa hybrid was an improvement on the old variety and had the capacity to produce 2,000 cocoa buds per tree, versus 350 produced by the old cocoa type. He said the new variety had a maturity time of two to two and half years, while the old cocoa variety took four or more years to mature.

''We want to restore the lost glory in the world trade of cocoa,'' said Adesina. ''We have completely lost those things we used to have because of the excessive emphasis the country has placed on importation. In the past, Nigeria used to be a leading force in oil palm production, but Malaysia has taken over palm oil production and they got the seedlings from Nigeria. My job as an agriculture minister is not to import food, but to export food.''

Recent press reports indicated that  Nigeria plans to increase its production of cocoa from the latest harvest of 250,000 tonnes to a targeted one million tonnes from 2018. Various steps are reportedly underway to increase yields from 350 to 500 kilograms of cocoa per hectare.

The rhetoric sounds good and there is a lot of it, but talk is cheap. Let's see if this agriculture minister achieves any more than the previous ones whose talking didn't quite translate into action; leaving fertile, wet and potentially mighty Nigeria deeply dependent on oil revenue and the importation of many food items.

African Agriculture

Some Ivorian farmers abandon cocoa to cultivate rubber trees

An increasing number of farmers in Ivory Coast are leaving the perceived difficulties of cultivating cocoa, the country's main cash crop, to instead grow rubber trees, which are considered to be a more secure source, less troublesome source of income.

This is according to a news report by Reuters, which says the cocoa industry hopes that reforms currently underway assure better prices for the crop's farmers will help stem the tide to cultivating alternative crops.

Liberia is the African country most often associated with rubber, but Ivorian rubber production reached an all-time high of 234,000 tonnes in 2011, from 183,000 tonnes in 2007.

An Ivorian rubber industry group said rubber was grown on 318,000 hectares of land in 2011, compared to
304,000 hectares in 2010. An additional 15,000 hectares of rubber trees are to be planted in 2012.

The Singapore-based International Rubber Study Group said the Ivory Coast had a plan to achieve 600,000 tonnes of rubber by the end of 2020, for which planting would have to be in place by 2013.

African Agriculture

The news report says for some farmers, rubber trees are seen as a safer bet than cocoa. They provide a more regular monthly income than seasonal cocoa, and rubber prices are more stable.

Some farmers are said to be cutting down their aging cocoa trees to replace them with rubber seedlings. An cocoa to replace the country's old cocoa bushes with new plantings that are higher yielding and more pest-resistant is underway. But whether this will slow the trend of farmers diversifying to rubber will depend on cocoa prices.

 

Ghanaian cocoa farmers to undergo training

Cargill, multinational company and major purchaser of cocoa, is to partner with the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) to train 15,000 farmers in better cultivation methods.

15,000 farmers in the cocoa farming communities of Ashanti and Western regions will participate in the programme designed to help them  'adopt better farming practices so they can improve the quality
and size of their yields,' according to  Cargill official.

The official said, "In farmer field-schools, farmers will receive extensive training to help them rejuvenate cocoa farms and apply best agricultural practices related to pest-control, harvest and post-harvest practices."


Cocobod's extension services will be the project's implementing partner.

 
African Agriculture

Olam International to invest $202 million in Ivory Coast cashew, cocoa, cotton

by Baudelaire Mieu

Olam International Ltd. (OLAM plans to spend 100 billion CFA francs ($201 million) on Ivory Coast investments including two cashew factories and a cocoa- processing plant.

The agricultural commodity trader based in Singapore has just opened a cashew factory with 30,000 tonne capacity in the central town of Bouake, the first of three planned in the county for coming years.

Olam also plans to invest 30 billion CFA francs in a cocoa- processing plant in the western town of San Pedro and double cotton growing in the north to 50,000 hectares (123,500 acres).

Ivory Coast’s cashew output grew to 350,000 tons in 2010, according to the latest data from growers’ group Intercajou.

Bloomberg

Climate change effects on West African cocoa may be coming true much earlier than predicted

A study conducted by the International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) that was released in September 2011 predicted that in 20 years time climate change could result in conditions that could seriously jeopardize cocoa cultivation in two key growing countries, Ghana and Ivory Coast, which account for more than 50% of global production.

Among other things, the study hypothesized that “an expected annual temperature rise of more than two degrees Celsius by 2050 will leave many of West Africa’s cocoa-producing areas too hot for chocolate.” But it warned that as early as 2030, when annual temperatures are expected to have gone up by one degree Celsius, many of today’s main cocoa-growing areas could be unsuitable for the crop.

The report then went on to suggest a number of coping strategies.

At the time of the report’s release, many people found it somewhat alarmist. Ghana’s Cocoboard was reported to have downplayed it, saying it was confident it had things well in hand for a climate change eventuality.

Yet less than six months after the release of the CIAT report, many of the worrying climate change events which were predicted for many years hence seem to have already hit some of the key cocoa-growing areas, especially in Ivory Coast.

While Ghana is celebrating having produced more than a million tonnes of cocoa in 2011, Ivory Coast’s present cocoa-growing season has been plagued by late-starting and erratic rains with long in-season dry spells that are expected to result in a harvest 8% lower than that of 2011.

It could be a downward blip that could be compensated for by good seasons in coming years> But the signs suggest that it would be prudent to begin to make preparation for the future with the assumption that this year’s unusual-for-Ivory Coast climate is a sign of things to come. It may turn out that the CIAT prediction of a significant climate effect on cocoa harvest by 2030 was not alarmist, but actually optimistic.

Cocoa is so important to the economies of Ghana and Ivory Coast that there is understandable resistance to contemplating a future in which it has a much reduced role, especially when there are no obvious cash crop alternatives to take its place. Besides, it is also tempting to dismiss Ivory Coast’s poorer than normal season as a localized event; especially since rain seasons have been largely normal in cocoa-growing regions of Ghana and Nigeria.

Yet examples from elsewhere in Africa point to adaptation needing to be done with even more urgency than even the experts have warned was necessary.

If the economies of Ghana and Ivory Coast are too dependent on cocoa as a cash crop, many countries in eastern and southern Africa are too reliant on maize as a staple crop. To an even more alarming extent than cocoa in West Africa, these regions have failed to heed the yearly signs that maize-growing is already becoming increasingly unsustainable over an ever-increasing proportion of their climatological zone. The various strategies currently employed to deal with this are unlikely to completely bridge the gap between rising maize needs and declining production.

Alternatives to maize will have to be sought, difficult to fathom or accept as that reality is for many people in these maize-obsessed regions. During Malawi, Zambia and South Africa’s recent string of maize ‘bumper harvests,’ the very suggestion that a future of reduced importance for maize may need to be urgently thought about would have seemed crazy. It probably still does, even as these three countries and several others contemplate possible maize deficits in the next few months. But ready or not, that is a reality that all these countries are going to have to face, perhaps not just ‘soon,’ but now.

Similarly, the reduced Ivorian cocoa harvest is probably a more realistic base from which to think about the crop’s future in West Africa than Ghana’s record harvest in 2011.

All three major West African cocoa-growing countries are taking steps to replace their aging cocoa bushes with newer, ‘improved’ stocks. This has long-needed to be done and will address some of the challenges of declining intrinsic productivity. But like GM maize in the increasingly-unsuitable parts of eastern and southern Africa, this may slightly postpone the day of reckoning for the cultivation of these crops, but not put it off indefinitely.

The problem is these are all approaching realities that no one wants to hear or think about.

African Agriculture

Cocoa crop pesticide runs out in Nigeria, threatening harvest

by Vincent Nwanma

Cocoa output from Nigeria, the fourth-biggest producer, is threatened by the shortage of an insecticide to fight mirids, the country’s cocoa association said.

Wet weather has brought on an onslaught of mirids, insects that attack cocoa leaves, Robo Adhuze, spokesman for the association, said on February 16. They could damage up to 40 percent of the crop, “if not treated quickly and adequately.”

Patemglobal Nigeria Ltd., which said it is the country’s main supplier of the insecticide Actara 25WG, has sold out of the product, said Patrick Ikemefuna, managing director. The company is waiting for more deliveries.

Adhuze is concerned because farmers need the insecticide immediately. “The rains have started and the chemical should be in use by now, but the likelihood is that the farmers will use unapproved chemicals or nothing at all,” he said. If that happens the bean quality could be rejected by the European Union and Japanese buyers, Adhuze said.

Output in the 2010-11 season was expected to be about 230,000 metric tons, or about 5 percent of global production, according to Marex Spectron Group Ltd.

Nigeria ranks behind the Ivory Coast, Ghana and Indonesia as the world’s largest cocoa producer, according to the website of the International Cocoa Organization.

Bloomberg

Ghana’s cocoa production tops 1 million tonnes in 2011

Ghana has achieved the long-cherished goal of surpassing one million tonnes of cocoa in a season. The historic figure was realized in 2011, a significant increase from the comparative figure of 680,000 tonnes in 2008.

President John Evans Atta Mills said on February 16 that as of January 2012, Ghanaian farmers were being paid about 80% of the average international cocoa market price of $2,450 per tonne.

Mills said the Ghana Cocoa Board had begun a six-year re-planting programme to rehabilitate old cocoa farms. Farmers are to be given hybrid cocoa seedlings free of charge to improve the country’s planting stock and improve yields.

African Agriculture

Malaysia to increase cocoa production, reduce imports from West Africa

Malaysia grows 5,000 tonnes of cocoa per year, but has plans in place to significantly increase local production and reduce imports.

Minister of Plantation Industries and Commodities, Tan Sri Bernard Dompok, has said the country aims to be self-sufficient in cocoa by 2020. The plan is for current production to have reached 60,000 tonnes per year by then.

An article in The Borneo Post quotes Dempok as saying Malaysian cocoa grinders were importing some 295,000 tonnes of cocoa beans annually from Indonesia, Ivory Coast and Ghana. He said in the eight years period the land allocated to cocoa production would increase by 2,000 hectares each year, from the present 20,543 hectares to 40,000 hectares.

The Malaysian Cocoa Board (LKM) is to start the development of new cocoa planting areas and rehabilitate about 1,000 hectares of low productivity or abandoned cocoa plantation projects.

Dompok said that although the target would not be able to fully support the country's cocoa bean grinding capacity of over 300,000 tonnes per year, it would help to promote the crop domestically while reducing the import of cocoa beans.

African Agriculture

Cameroon cocoa price rises on tight supplies

Farmgate cocoa prices in Cameroon's main cocoa growing regions rose slightly in February compared with the previous month on tight supplies as the main crop harvest tailed off, farmers said on February 15.

Farmers said prices rose to 1,000 CFA francs per kg in Kumba and Bafia, the main trading centres in the South-West and Centre regions, from 950 CFA francs/kg and 925 CFA francs/kg in January respectively.

"The increase is good news for the farmers, many of whom will see their output reduced by pest attacks this year," said Emmanuel Nnogo Akolo who farms near Emana, about 70 km north of the capital Yaounde.

Akolo said earlier than expected rainfall in the past week has raised hopes of a better mid-crop harvest. A long dry spell coupled with insect attacks on plantations is threatening output in the world's fifth largest cocoa producer, which grew a record 240,000 tonnes in 2010/11.

Cameroon's Cocoa Development Company (SODECAO) expecting production to rise to 250,000 tonnes in 2011/12.

Cameroon's cocoa season runs from August to July with the main harvest taking place between October to February, while a smaller mid crop is harvested from May to July. The Centre and South-West account for 80 percent of Cameroon's output.

Reuters

Equatorial Guinea promotes its nascent cocoa sector with a ‘discount sale’

Equatorial Guinea is not known for its cocoa, or particularly for any other agricultural products. Yet the small country in West Africa could become an importer grower, being in the same region as big producers Ivory Coast and Ghana.

The presence of oil may have something to do with the neglect of agriculture, but the government insists it wants to change this, and is investing in the sector.

In an apparent effort to attract international attention to its cocoa-growing attention, the government announced a sale of 330 tonnes of the commodity at ‘a discounted price. It is hoped the sale would also act as a motivator to local farmers to increases cocoa production.

The sale was announced by minister of agriculture, Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, who is also the son of the president.

No prices were announced for the sale, but a February 8 2012 statement said, “Minister Nguema wants to offer buyers a good quality product at a price they can afford.”

"The cocoa subsidy is an effort to encourage cocoa buyers around the world to purchase Equatorial Guinea cocoa," Nguema.

To put the 330 tonnes into perspective, Ghana is hoping to soon achieve annual production of a million tones of cocoa.

African Agriculture

Chocolate industry seeks to secure its West African supply chain

              
 

The big international chocolate companies are increasingly seeking measures to ensure that their supply of the confection’s main ingredient cocoa, mostly grown in West Africa, is secure.

The efforts go far beyond just cultivation issues. A key area of attempted intervention is the controversial one of child labor on family farms. In many traditional settings, it is considered entirely normal for children to take part in family farming, but there is a particular outcry about it in leading chocolate markets. Seeking to avoid accusations of supporting child exploitation, several chocolate majors have announced high-profile projects which they fund or are otherwise involved in to stop the practice.

Competing chocolate companies are coming together to support efforts for farmers to produce more cocoa to meet rising world demand.

Some of the threats they worry about: Space to grow cocoa is limited; it only thrives in equatorial climates. About a third of the crop grown every year is trashed because of pests and disease. Unstable political conditions in cocoa-producing nations also adds to the volatility in the market.

U.S.-based Hershey has just announced a $10 million project to help end child labor. The company also supports a program to provide cocoa farmers climate and pest control information by cell phone.

Other companies are involved in improving access to education and other services in cocoa-growing regions.

Will all these efforts actually help West Africa’s cocoa farmers?

more…Fortune Magazine

Liberia receives $25 million loan for cocoa, coffee sectors

The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) will provide a US$24.9 million loan to the  Liberia to improve food security and reduce post conflict poverty in rural communities.

The loan agreement for the Smallholder Tree Crop Revitalisation Support Project will aim to increase the incomes of cocoa and coffee producers by raising the quantity of produce sold.

The project will revitalize 50 per cent of existing plantations and restore 315 kilometres of rural road networks to improve access to market centres for more than 280,000 people. In addition, the project will strengthen both the private sector and extension services to smallholder farmer cooperatives by the Ministry of Agriculture.

The project will reach out to the most vulnerable rural farming households in Lofa County, where the highest number of smallholder cocoa and coffee producers live; most of Liberia's poor people live in this area. More than 15,000 smallholder cocoa and coffee farmers, of which half are women, will benefit directly from the project.

With this new project, IFAD will have financed 5 programmes and projects in Liberia for a total investment of $38.3 million benefitting 30,000 households.

International Fund for Agricultural Development

Political unrest and drought endanger Ivory Coast cocoa output

Political unrest in the Ivory Coast, where 40 per cent of the world’s cocoa beans are grown, has ‘significantly’ depleted the number of certified fair trade cocoa farmers. Many have fled the West ­African country, while fair trade training programmes have also come to a halt because of the danger farmers face in rural areas.

The situation is already affecting chocolate manufacturers, who are facing the highest cocoa prices for over 30 years. Prices jumped by 10 per cent this month alone. Analysts are predicting they could soon hit $3,720 per metric tonne - a level last seen in January 1979.

more...Daily Mail

Meanwhile, Reuters reports that lower than normal rain and hot weather in late January may also cocoa Ivorian reduce yields

Farmers, who need abundant rainfall and spells of sunny weather to grow cocoa, the main ingredient for making chocolate, said the long dry spell had killed many young trees.
African Agriculture