Ghana to start cocoa light crop purchases on Friday, price unchanged, regulator says
By Maxwell Akalaare Adombila
ACCRA, June 17 (Reuters) -Ghana will start purchases from the cocoa light crop on Friday, maintaining the price it pays farmers at 33,120 cedi ($2,215) per metric ton, the country's Cocobod regulator said on Sunday.
The world's second largest cocoa exporter after Ivory Coast runs a two-cycle cocoa season consisting of the main crop which is mainly exported and the light crop harvest, discounted for local grinders.
The industry regulator said in a statement that cocoa beans would continue to be sold at 2,070 cedi ($138.46) per bag of 64 kilograms during the light crop harvest, which usually lasts for 11 weeks.
In April, the west African nation raised the fixed farmgate price by more than 58% for the rest of the 2023/24 season in response to high prices in neighbouring Ivory Coast that led to a pick up in smuggling.
Ghana expects cocoa output to be almost 40% below target in the 2023/24 season due to a combination of scant rain, extreme heat, smuggling and disease.
The tight cocoa supply in Ghana and Ivory Coast, which together produce more than 60% of the world's cocoa, have contributed to record global prices for the main ingredient in chocolate.
Sources told Reuters earlier this month that Ghana was looking to delay delivery of up to 350,000 tons of cocoa beans to next season due to poor crop yields, adding to the challenges facing the chocolate industry.
Cocobod said last week it expected output to rebound strongly next season to over 800,000 tons, helped by better weather conditions and farms eradicated of diseased plants.
The regulator also expects the higher farmgate price to help to slow down cocoa smuggling that it said was funded by foreigners based in neighbouring Togo, Burkina Faso and Guinea.
($1 = 14.9500 Ghanian cedi)
Reporting by Maxwell Akalaare Adombila; Editing by Anait Miridzhanian and Mark Potter
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