Post by Trade facilitator on Apr 28, 2023 0:54:15 GMT 1
Cocoa is a major cash crop for boosting rural income and export earnings. But production has been falling in the years preceding the pandemic. There have been concerns about the inability of the government to work with the private sector with a strategic target of increasing production from about 250,000 to 500,000 metric tonnes (MT) yearly. Operators are, therefore, calling for measures to turn around the industry, seen as a major component of economic revival. DANIEL ESSIET writes.
As Nigeria’s cocoa continues to gain global recognition, the President, Federation of Agricultural Commodity Association of Nigeria (FACAN), Dr. Victor Iyama, is pushing for the revival of the industry so the country can join the ranks of top earners from the booming global chocolate market.
The demand for chocolate has helped to position the cocoa industry as a potential growth driver for the agriculture sector. The global chocolate industry worth $127.9 billion this year, according to MarketsandMarkets, an international research, growth advisory, and analytics firm and has substantially increased the income and yields of thousands of cocoa and coffee-growing families.
Iyama has been reaping heavily from cocoa – an activity he has been engaged in for more than 20 years. He is not ashamed to encourage youths and retired civil servants to put money into it and live off from a reliable pension from the tree of gold. He has been engaging people about the crop and offering them advice on how to go about it.
In a good season, he looks forward to harvesting thousands of kilogrammes of cocoa for export. Consequently, he has been on the campaign to give cocoa an important place as an export commodity and a cash crop for increasing rural incomes and increasing urban food supplies.
He has seen healthy yields and an improvement in his income since he began planting a locally adapted seed variety. But, according to him, not many farmers have access to such varieties.
However, with so much challenges, including insecurity, he realized that it is becoming difficult to harvest enough supply of cocoa domestically because the small holder farmers lack access to affordable planting materials and the infrastructure to secure a stable supply of seed and herbicides.
With their emphasis on providing food security for a nation of 200 million, Iyama said increasing cocoa cultivation was an important – if not essential – part of the solution.
His words: “We are talking about 400,000 tonnes when our counterparts are doing one million to two million tonnes per annum. There must be a concerted effort to grow cocoa. Cocoa can be grown in commercial quantities in 28 states. We should have to make it a national call. Apart from bringing the needed foreign exchange, it will provide employment for 100,000s, if not millions of Nigerians. We should embark on aggressive planting of nurseries and establishment of cocoa gardens, using the new varieties that can produce in two to two and half years. Some can fruit in less than two years with higher yields.”
In partnership with the Cocoa Association of Nigeria(CAN), FACAN plans to carry out programmes to improve the livelihoods of cocoa-farming families.
If a renaissance is expected, the National President, Cocoa Farmers Association of Nigeria (CFAN) Comrade Adeola Adegoke, wants the government to work with the private sector to improve the quality of cocoa beans produced across the country as well as support local companies to acquire processing facilities.
Where he operates, cocoa has enabled farmers to educate their children and grandchildren. With knowledge, skills, and market exposure, he has established strong direct links with international buyers. He sees cocoa farming as a very profitable business. He has taken advantage of empowerment programmes to improve his crop yields and the value-addition process.
To seize on the industry’s potential, he explained that a lot of farmers would need empowerment to adopt technological improvements that would make the industry globally competitive.
So far, he explained that not much has been done by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to support cocoa like other crops. “If you look at the Anchor Borrowers Programme, rice got close to N1 trillion as financial support from CBN, cassava close to about N1 trillion too.
“Other commodities got huge investments. But it was a different case with the cocoa sector. Truly, the attention to cocoa is nothing to write home about. The investment is so low to incentivise the small holder farmers to do more. If you look at the state of the sector in the 60s and 70s, you will find out that we were then the second largest producer of cocoa in West Africa. We produced about 950,000 tonnes. Now we are producing something like 340,000 tonnes annually. Fortunately, we have many states that can produce cocoa. We have about 22 states where cocoa can be grow in Nigeria. Despite this, our state of investment in cocoa production is very low. Right now, there are 14 major cocoa producing states where you find hubs in the senatorial districts. You see trees with better yields, which show that Nigeria has the potential. The land is there. Sadly, many of the cocoa farms and plantations have been abandoned. The trees are old with no replacements.
“The state governments have not shown massive support for cocoa development. Whatever progress the industry is witnessing, from production to export, is private sector driven. Also, 90 per cent of cocoa is exported raw. Despite that the sector is not doing remarkable well, cocoa is still driving forex. Seriously, the system is stalked against the farmers.They are not getting right incentives and support.”
Smallholder farmers, Adegoke indicated, produce 75 per cent of cocoa, on plots between and one and two hectares.
For him, higher-quality cocoa seed varieties would help to attract young people to the sector because they allow for quick and bountiful harvests. He added that the future of cocoa farming lies in the hands of the youth.
He noted that Nigeria possesses some of the most fertile soil that could yield premium quality cocoa crops.
“We are facing a peculiar climate change situation, so we need varieties that are resistant to its impact. We have varieties that can fruit in 18 months, but other countries have gotten seeds that can fruit in 12 months. We have countries where you can get an average yield of three tonnes per hectare. We are witnessing heat because of climate change. Cocoa Research Institute of Nigeria (CRIN) is the best research institute in the country promoting cocoa production. Even with its capacity, we don’t have varieties that can cope with our environment,” he said.
The global supply of cocoa is expected to fall short of demand due to climate change and growing consumption. To this end, analysts such as the founder/Chief Executive, JMSF Agribusiness Nigeria, Richard Ogundele, desires that the industry boosts domestic output to become a cocoa superpower.
He advocated measures to drive rapid improvement in cocoa farming through technologies that are popular with farmers.
His words: “We need to develop new plantations with improved hybrid varieties with shorter gestation periods. We need to go into processing to attain finished products to optimise the value chain. Selling raw beans is not in our interest or advantage. We need to fully optimise the value chain end to end.”
While cocoa has provided a critical source of revenue for smallholder farmers, producers still suffer from low productivity caused by poor farm management practices.
On a national scale, there are programmes to build the capacities of farmers’associations to reach the goal of producing 500,000 tonnes of cocoa beans yearly by 2025.
OCP Africa is supporting farmers to improve the quality and quantity of their cocoa through proper fertiliser application. The company signed an agreement with the CRIN to develop a specific fertiliser product for cocoa-producing ecological zones . It involved soil fertility evaluation, including intensive and extensive soil, foliage and yield analyses to create cocoa specific fertiliser formulations tailored to the different cocoa-producing ecological zones of Nigeria.
Speaking with The Nation, Head, Agronomy Services and Farmer-centric Projects, OCP Africa, Dr Donald Kelechi Madukwe, said CRIN has completed validation trials for the fertiliser. He expressed that the product would be commercialised soon and launched into the market to help farmers earn more money and improve their livelihood.
“The next stage is commercialisation.We are planning a national launch and then commercialization of the specialty cocoa fertiliser-possibly this year,” he added.
The United States’ Department of Agriculture is funding Lutheran World Relief with $21.3 million under its Food for Progress Programme to launch a cocoa productivity and marketing project in Nigeria.
Known as the Traceability and Resilience in Agriculture and Cocoa Ecosystems of Nigeria (TRACE), the five-year project is aimed at increasing productivity.
The award follows a White House announcement of more than $2.9 billion in a new U.S. assistance to address growing global food insecurity. Of that amount, $178 million is being awarded under the Food for Progress.
To strengthen the cocoa value chain and improve the livelihoods of its farmers, TRACE will provide training in improved agricultural production techniques, develop business solutions to improve farmer access to goods and services, strengthen business development capacity, promote traceability in buyer-seller relationships, advocate for improved policy and regulatory frameworks affecting sustainable cocoa development and disseminate better market information through a multi-channel communications campaign.
In partnership with the Federal and state governments, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture(IITA), CRIN, Ecometrica, and C-Lever.org, Lutheran World Relief will implement TRACE in Abia, Akwa Ibom, Cross Rivers, Ekiti, Ondo, and Osun states.
For Country Representative at Cultivating New Frontiers in Agriculture (CNFA), WA ProCashew Project, Olorunfemi Toyin, a combination of interventions is needed to improve the poor income position of cocoa farmers.
He added: “More attention should be given to value addition to optimise the potential in the value chain. The government should increase tax on export and use such taxes as incentives to boost cocoa production and support the growth of local industries. More emphasis on organic production is equally important to create profitable price points for farmers and processors. Policies to address enabling environment inefficiencies are crucial.
“Agricultural policies are development policies. They should not only be formulated without more, but implemented with the required political will.The private sector needs support more than ever before to remain in business, especially in the face of the economic challenges, currency crisis, fuel scarcity, inflation, insecurity and so on. All these upsides are having a downside effect signalling the government’s attention.”
Source: thenationonlineng.net/lifting-cocoa-from-the-doldrums/
As Nigeria’s cocoa continues to gain global recognition, the President, Federation of Agricultural Commodity Association of Nigeria (FACAN), Dr. Victor Iyama, is pushing for the revival of the industry so the country can join the ranks of top earners from the booming global chocolate market.
The demand for chocolate has helped to position the cocoa industry as a potential growth driver for the agriculture sector. The global chocolate industry worth $127.9 billion this year, according to MarketsandMarkets, an international research, growth advisory, and analytics firm and has substantially increased the income and yields of thousands of cocoa and coffee-growing families.
Iyama has been reaping heavily from cocoa – an activity he has been engaged in for more than 20 years. He is not ashamed to encourage youths and retired civil servants to put money into it and live off from a reliable pension from the tree of gold. He has been engaging people about the crop and offering them advice on how to go about it.
In a good season, he looks forward to harvesting thousands of kilogrammes of cocoa for export. Consequently, he has been on the campaign to give cocoa an important place as an export commodity and a cash crop for increasing rural incomes and increasing urban food supplies.
He has seen healthy yields and an improvement in his income since he began planting a locally adapted seed variety. But, according to him, not many farmers have access to such varieties.
However, with so much challenges, including insecurity, he realized that it is becoming difficult to harvest enough supply of cocoa domestically because the small holder farmers lack access to affordable planting materials and the infrastructure to secure a stable supply of seed and herbicides.
With their emphasis on providing food security for a nation of 200 million, Iyama said increasing cocoa cultivation was an important – if not essential – part of the solution.
His words: “We are talking about 400,000 tonnes when our counterparts are doing one million to two million tonnes per annum. There must be a concerted effort to grow cocoa. Cocoa can be grown in commercial quantities in 28 states. We should have to make it a national call. Apart from bringing the needed foreign exchange, it will provide employment for 100,000s, if not millions of Nigerians. We should embark on aggressive planting of nurseries and establishment of cocoa gardens, using the new varieties that can produce in two to two and half years. Some can fruit in less than two years with higher yields.”
In partnership with the Cocoa Association of Nigeria(CAN), FACAN plans to carry out programmes to improve the livelihoods of cocoa-farming families.
If a renaissance is expected, the National President, Cocoa Farmers Association of Nigeria (CFAN) Comrade Adeola Adegoke, wants the government to work with the private sector to improve the quality of cocoa beans produced across the country as well as support local companies to acquire processing facilities.
Where he operates, cocoa has enabled farmers to educate their children and grandchildren. With knowledge, skills, and market exposure, he has established strong direct links with international buyers. He sees cocoa farming as a very profitable business. He has taken advantage of empowerment programmes to improve his crop yields and the value-addition process.
To seize on the industry’s potential, he explained that a lot of farmers would need empowerment to adopt technological improvements that would make the industry globally competitive.
So far, he explained that not much has been done by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to support cocoa like other crops. “If you look at the Anchor Borrowers Programme, rice got close to N1 trillion as financial support from CBN, cassava close to about N1 trillion too.
“Other commodities got huge investments. But it was a different case with the cocoa sector. Truly, the attention to cocoa is nothing to write home about. The investment is so low to incentivise the small holder farmers to do more. If you look at the state of the sector in the 60s and 70s, you will find out that we were then the second largest producer of cocoa in West Africa. We produced about 950,000 tonnes. Now we are producing something like 340,000 tonnes annually. Fortunately, we have many states that can produce cocoa. We have about 22 states where cocoa can be grow in Nigeria. Despite this, our state of investment in cocoa production is very low. Right now, there are 14 major cocoa producing states where you find hubs in the senatorial districts. You see trees with better yields, which show that Nigeria has the potential. The land is there. Sadly, many of the cocoa farms and plantations have been abandoned. The trees are old with no replacements.
“The state governments have not shown massive support for cocoa development. Whatever progress the industry is witnessing, from production to export, is private sector driven. Also, 90 per cent of cocoa is exported raw. Despite that the sector is not doing remarkable well, cocoa is still driving forex. Seriously, the system is stalked against the farmers.They are not getting right incentives and support.”
Smallholder farmers, Adegoke indicated, produce 75 per cent of cocoa, on plots between and one and two hectares.
For him, higher-quality cocoa seed varieties would help to attract young people to the sector because they allow for quick and bountiful harvests. He added that the future of cocoa farming lies in the hands of the youth.
He noted that Nigeria possesses some of the most fertile soil that could yield premium quality cocoa crops.
“We are facing a peculiar climate change situation, so we need varieties that are resistant to its impact. We have varieties that can fruit in 18 months, but other countries have gotten seeds that can fruit in 12 months. We have countries where you can get an average yield of three tonnes per hectare. We are witnessing heat because of climate change. Cocoa Research Institute of Nigeria (CRIN) is the best research institute in the country promoting cocoa production. Even with its capacity, we don’t have varieties that can cope with our environment,” he said.
The global supply of cocoa is expected to fall short of demand due to climate change and growing consumption. To this end, analysts such as the founder/Chief Executive, JMSF Agribusiness Nigeria, Richard Ogundele, desires that the industry boosts domestic output to become a cocoa superpower.
He advocated measures to drive rapid improvement in cocoa farming through technologies that are popular with farmers.
His words: “We need to develop new plantations with improved hybrid varieties with shorter gestation periods. We need to go into processing to attain finished products to optimise the value chain. Selling raw beans is not in our interest or advantage. We need to fully optimise the value chain end to end.”
While cocoa has provided a critical source of revenue for smallholder farmers, producers still suffer from low productivity caused by poor farm management practices.
On a national scale, there are programmes to build the capacities of farmers’associations to reach the goal of producing 500,000 tonnes of cocoa beans yearly by 2025.
OCP Africa is supporting farmers to improve the quality and quantity of their cocoa through proper fertiliser application. The company signed an agreement with the CRIN to develop a specific fertiliser product for cocoa-producing ecological zones . It involved soil fertility evaluation, including intensive and extensive soil, foliage and yield analyses to create cocoa specific fertiliser formulations tailored to the different cocoa-producing ecological zones of Nigeria.
Speaking with The Nation, Head, Agronomy Services and Farmer-centric Projects, OCP Africa, Dr Donald Kelechi Madukwe, said CRIN has completed validation trials for the fertiliser. He expressed that the product would be commercialised soon and launched into the market to help farmers earn more money and improve their livelihood.
“The next stage is commercialisation.We are planning a national launch and then commercialization of the specialty cocoa fertiliser-possibly this year,” he added.
The United States’ Department of Agriculture is funding Lutheran World Relief with $21.3 million under its Food for Progress Programme to launch a cocoa productivity and marketing project in Nigeria.
Known as the Traceability and Resilience in Agriculture and Cocoa Ecosystems of Nigeria (TRACE), the five-year project is aimed at increasing productivity.
The award follows a White House announcement of more than $2.9 billion in a new U.S. assistance to address growing global food insecurity. Of that amount, $178 million is being awarded under the Food for Progress.
To strengthen the cocoa value chain and improve the livelihoods of its farmers, TRACE will provide training in improved agricultural production techniques, develop business solutions to improve farmer access to goods and services, strengthen business development capacity, promote traceability in buyer-seller relationships, advocate for improved policy and regulatory frameworks affecting sustainable cocoa development and disseminate better market information through a multi-channel communications campaign.
In partnership with the Federal and state governments, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture(IITA), CRIN, Ecometrica, and C-Lever.org, Lutheran World Relief will implement TRACE in Abia, Akwa Ibom, Cross Rivers, Ekiti, Ondo, and Osun states.
For Country Representative at Cultivating New Frontiers in Agriculture (CNFA), WA ProCashew Project, Olorunfemi Toyin, a combination of interventions is needed to improve the poor income position of cocoa farmers.
He added: “More attention should be given to value addition to optimise the potential in the value chain. The government should increase tax on export and use such taxes as incentives to boost cocoa production and support the growth of local industries. More emphasis on organic production is equally important to create profitable price points for farmers and processors. Policies to address enabling environment inefficiencies are crucial.
“Agricultural policies are development policies. They should not only be formulated without more, but implemented with the required political will.The private sector needs support more than ever before to remain in business, especially in the face of the economic challenges, currency crisis, fuel scarcity, inflation, insecurity and so on. All these upsides are having a downside effect signalling the government’s attention.”
Source: thenationonlineng.net/lifting-cocoa-from-the-doldrums/
