The 100,000 cocoa farmers Frank Okyere represents as head of Ghana’s Kuapa Kokoo co-operative eke out hardscrabble lives despite producing the raw material for a global chocolate industry worth an annual $100bn in retail sales.
The world’s two largest cocoa producing countries, Ivory Coast and Ghana, have added a supplement to the sale price in an effort to alleviate poverty. But a dispute over whether global buyers were prepared to pay illustrates how hard it will be for the two nations to control and lift prices in an industry dominated by millions of smallholders.
“We are not asking too much from industry, just meet our cost of production and help us get something small to live,” said Mr Okyere. “I don’t think it’s too much to ask, because once they do that they can still make big profits.”
The disagreement centred on a $400-a-tonne “living income differential” (LID) added to the price of cocoa harvested from this crop year, bought from Ivory…