Reviving cocoa in Côte d'Ivoire

The project aims to increase yields and improve the livelihoods of tens of thousands of cocoa farming families.

In 2010, the World Agroforestry Centre and Mars Inc, one of the world's largest chocolate producers, launched a major public-private partnership – known as Vision for Change – in Côte d'Ivoire. The project aims to increase yields and improve the livelihoods of tens of thousands of cocoa farming families. This will primarily be done by rehabilitating old cocoa gardens using high-yielding varieties of cocoa and good agricultural practices.

Despite the political turmoil in Côte d'Ivoire, following disputed elections, 13 technicians – nine employed by the World Agroforestry Centre and four by national partners – travelled to Indonesia in 2011 for a training programme led by Mars staff at its Cocoa Development Centre in Sulawesi. Christophe Kouame, the Centre's project manager in Côte d'Ivoire, made a similar journey. The Ivorians learnt about grafting, disease management and other important issues, as well as the institutional arrangements trialled and tested by Mars and local farmers.

The Sulawesi story is told in full in a 'Trees for Change' booklet, Cocoa Futures. Thanks to the activities promoted by Mars and its partners, many Indonesian cocoa farmers have more than doubled their yields and incomes. Farmers have learned about new production techniques through demonstrations at cocoa development centres, which in turn support a network of farmer-owned 'village cocoa clinics'.

In 2010, Kouame and his staff established two cocoa development centres in Soubré region, Côte d'Ivoire, each of which now services a network of centres villageoises de cacaoculture. Many more cocoa development centres will be established over the coming years.

When the project was first proposed, it was suspected that Mars and its partners wanted to increase production in order to reduce prices. "We had to convince them that this wasn't the case," says Tony Simons, who was World Agroforestry's deputy director general when the project was launched. At present, farmers have an average of 3 hectares each, with yields of around 400 kg per hectare. "If we can push yields up to 1000 kg per hectare, then farmers could produce the same amount of cocoa on just over a third of their land. They could then devote the rest of their land to timber, fruit and other crops."

The project will not only improve cocoa productivity in Côte d'Ivoire, but encourage farmers to plant a mosaic of different crops and restore a degraded environment. This should dramatically improve the welfare of rural communities, and ensure that Mars and its competitors have a high-quality supply of the raw material they need to prosper in future.

Pye-Smith C. 2011. COCOA FUTURES: An innovative programme of research and training is transforming the lives of cocoa-growers in Indonesia and beyond. Trees for Change No 9. Nairobi: World Agroforestry Centre.